


That Narrow and Savage Road

by lye_tea



Series: Red String of Fate [1]
Category: InuYasha - A Feudal Fairy Tale
Genre: Angst, Drama, F/M, Loosely interpreted "Romance", Red String of Fate, Reincarnation, Tragedy, bildungsroman
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-17
Updated: 2019-04-17
Packaged: 2020-01-15 08:51:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18495535
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lye_tea/pseuds/lye_tea
Summary: For centuries, he waits to attain her again. But memory can be a prison as is the madness of grief. Kismets are distinct and finite. And what is lost can never be found.





	That Narrow and Savage Road

**Author's Note:**

> Please read the warnings.

**A/N:** I FINALLY saw  _The Final Act_  and had to hash out some thoughts I had buzzing around while watching. Never thought I'd be writing IY fanfic again. Tbh, I'm more than a little embarrassed. Haha.

 **WARNINGS:** This is a reincarnation fic and contains a modern mid to late-teenage character in sexual situations. Section VII comprises of  _very_  dubious consent. It's NOT a happy story; it's creepy and messed up in so many ways (cos I'm really a dirty old man at heart). I also apologize for the length, but if I didn't write it as a oneshot, I was never going to finish it.

See end for glossary and footnotes.

 

* * *

 

**That Narrow and Savage Road**

 

And be one traveler, long I stood  
And looked down one as far as I could

— _The Road Not Taken_  by Robert Frost

 

**I.**

 

It's been three years since Higurashi Kagome first fell down a well.

It's been four hundred years since she died.

Sesshomaru tracks the days, the months, the infinities it'll take. Languidly, eons move until one day he too will subside to the songs of playground games. But for now (and what seems millennia ahead) he must linger and suffer the destiny all legends bore.

_The last of an unparalleled legacy._

Gloating, his mother had remarked. Her sarcasm wasn't unnoticed.

She departed for her castle in the skies sometime in the nineteenth century and proclaimed (rather stridently) never to return.

Her vow lasted two weeks. She'd forgotten a comb.

Yet as the centuries went, Sesshomaru saw less and less of her. She and the remnants of their race have faded into fantasy, fractured to the footnotes of a folkloric compendium. Their numbers dwindled as humans proliferated. By 1900, very few yokai chose to live in their original state. The powerful ones evolved to obscure their markings and mastered the art of assimilation.

Now, he is the last daiyokai in Japan.

He's heard stories of a daija in China who is approaching three thousand and supposedly a former pupil of Kannon. Perhaps the only one mighty enough to rival him this side of the earth. Perhaps even more  _formidable_ —he crushes the wayward thought.

Regardless, that one he will avoid (if the narratives can even be trusted).

He's learned many lessons throughout history. The paramount, singular one is money. Even now, it's a peculiar concept to him: the sway a piece of paper holds. But Sesshomaru is pragmatic above all else. So he acquired banks and their accounts because money is the new god demanding sacrifices.

At the turn to the twentieth century, he began to build. The green pastures and mist-dappled bamboo groves that once sprawled his domains ceded to vertical, reinforced concrete structures soaring high.

With ease, he adapted to the onslaught of modernity and even adopted some of its eccentricities to divert his mind. Still, the years dragged on sluggishly with each decade blurring into the next. Tedium has become his constant companion. Then today of all days, Sesshomaru sees her through his car's tinted window at an intersection in Shibuya. In a navy school blazer and pleated skirt, waiting for the crosswalk light to turn.

The last time they met, she was wrinkled and hoary, body grown soft and round from bearing and rearing children. But today, she is young again.

"Higurashi Kagome," he mutters in disbelief.

\--

"What is today's date?"

"February 25th, sir."

"The year."

"Uh, 2000?"

"That is all."

"Sir?"

"You are dismissed."

Puzzled, his assistant muses if the gossips about his new boss are true.

\--

_I saw her. Rin was there in my time. I saw her as a little girl again in front of Ginza Station. On February 28, 2000…She'll be there that afternoon...February 28, 2000…Ginza. You'll find her there._

In the Sengoku Jidai, Higuarashi Kagome told him this.

She promised.

\--

Kagome is the one with Rin when she dies.

Kagome dribbles water into her mouth as the fever corrodes her constitution while Rin keeps questioning why it's cold, so cold, when it's the apex of summer. Insatiable, the infection roars until she is dehydrated and wilted like a moon-scarred flower sucked of vitality. She is strong throughout the ordeal, even as she retches out her innards.

Rin dies smiling, repeating that Sesshomaru-sama will come—come see her one last time.

He never does.

He arrives a month after the burial (a lifetime too late).

He knows that she is gone long before he sets foot onto the village proper. Her fragrance has dispersed, drifted out of reach. As is too her laugh. Her touch. Her—

Sesshomaru stops (can bear it no more).

_This weary little life she led._

She was only sixteen.

"The dysentery came very suddenly. A third of the village died. We don't have vaccines or antibiotics yet," Kagome comments.

Sesshomaru surveys her quizzically.

"Treatments from my time," she hastily supplies. "They don't exist here. There was nothing that could've been done."

 _There was nothing you could do_.

"She was very brave, especially in the end."

"Did she suffer?"

Kagome circumspectly formulates her words. "Not too much."

_There are worse ways to die._

"I see."

Sesshomaru examines the polished stone that marks her grave. Her name is carved in stark, straight lines. Such a pitiful thing to signify her death, to promulgate the event as mundane and unequivocal a matter as the switching of seasons or the crack of thunder trailing lightning.

How short her life had been. How brief—trifling—it seems. An errant draft that blew in his direction (was blown off-course).

 _Gone_.

That is the summation of her few, brittle years. All encapsulated by a pebble.

\--

Dropping the spade, Kagome dabs away the beading moisture from her neck. Sometimes, in moments like this, she wishes for the conveniences of her own era. Nonetheless, she beams with pride at the medicine garden. Jinenji is a good teacher.

She is twenty-six and the mother of two, and spidery wrinkles are blooming on her forehead. Inuyasha stands beside her, as handsome and unaltered from the day she met him.

"Inuyasha, how long do yokai live?"

"A couple hundred years, thousands? It depends on the yokai. Why d'ya want to know? Checking to see how much time I've got left?" he banters.

Kagome waves aside the quip. "I saw Rin's reincarnation once. It was right before I came back for good. Do you think Sesshomaru would want to know? Should I tell him? Do you think he could be there, in my time?"

"I don't know. He could be. We all know he's too stubborn to die. But I don't think you should tell him what you saw. How could you tell it was really Rin, anyway?"

"It was definitely Rin!" She nods emphatically.

"I still don't think we should mention anything. Probably best to 'let leaping dogs lie.'"

"Sleeping. Let sleeping dogs lie," she corrects automatically. "And maybe you're right. Maybe he'd have forgotten by then. Five hundred years is a long time. Even for a daiyokai."

Kagome declares the last part with such conviction that she almost believes it.

\--

Inuyasha is already a grandfather when he sees his brother again. Over fifty years have passed since Rin's death. Kaede is long gone too as are Sango and Miroku. Steadfast, Kagome remains by his side, but her health is fragile and day by day, she grows distant more and more as if in sight of interment. For the inevitability of mortality.

All three of their living children favor their mother's humanity (one having died in his ninth winter). One grandchild, however, shares his ears.

Freeing a lock of hair from his granddaughter's fist, Inuyasha turns to his unwanted guest. The years have done nothing to mitigate their mutual dislike. A grudging tolerance has burgeoned though both favor minimum contact—preferably none.

"Better get this over with," Inuyasha growls.

Discomfort congeals into an oleaginous knot in his stomach. Agitated and erratic, it writhes like a squelching worm. Inuyasha instinctively holds his granddaughter closer, iron-tight against his chest.

 

**II.**

 

Sesshomaru stirs the porcelain demitasse with a surgical diligence. Meticulously, he adds a single sugar cube and a dollop of cream into the piney, pungent liquid. Coffee is one of the few inventions that humans got right. He isn't exactly fond of the taste, but the nutty aroma helps mask the surrounding stench.

Thrice a day for the past four decades (since he visited Florence) he repeats this ritual. Always one sugar and a trickle of cream. Always a ristretto made with spring water. The water source (not many realize) makes a substantial difference.

He takes a small sip (passable if not palatable) before resuming his wake.

By sheer serendipity, today falls on a Monday—what the humans call a  _workday_. Most people do not loiter in upscale coffeehouses at 3.47 PM on Mondays. That is a treat for the  _weekends_.

It fascinates him how they tell time. They create ever-expanding names like hours, minutes, seconds, milliseconds and microseconds and nanoseconds and so on and so forth. Every part must be duly measured.

Honored.

Remembered.

"Will there be anything else, sir?"

Sesshomaru glances at the waiter. He likes this boy, for this one knows not to overstep. "No," he says.

The boy gives a slight bow and promptly returns to his post behind the bar. Observant. Professional. Almost  _admirable_ in his labors. Yes, Sesshomaru notes, he likes this one a lot.

For the past two days, he has been coming to the café, arriving at the tail end of brunch. The espresso is decent, but more crucially, the shop offers a panorama of Ginza Station.

Before him, a scuffed vintage clock preens impressively, its gears busy at work. Above, the chic speaker system loops the same piano solo. Further away, behind the kitchen doors, the hum of a dishwasher reverberates against mopped, sterile tiles. And beyond that, separated by a blackened brick wall, one employee yells at another not to overload the trash bag.

There is no respite in this metropolis.

Tokyo emits a perpetual fetidness. Bloated and hot, the stench festers, gorging off fermenting excreta and necrotic vapor. The corruption has impregnated his clothes, swathing the fine fibers in a noxious layer.

He needs to leave. Go to the mountains for his biannual "vacation" before he is impelled to stalk the slums and dingy back lanes for game. Not that he needs to kill. He kills because he  _wants_  to. There's a salient, savage distinction: desire is more refined.

Frowning, Sesshomaru checks the clock. Tick-tock, the hour hits four. The miko was positive of the date: February 28th.  _If not the time._

Incertitude is an unfamiliar emotion to him. Worse is the surreptitious susurration of failure assailing his nerves—prolonged, drawn, it drawls of his incompetence. That his journey has been in vain and he ( _weak_ ) is truly unable to wrest her from the clenches of cosmic will.

Perhaps the miko was wrong. Perhaps it has been an insane aspiration, perhaps…no matter. His vacuous little brother is still alive. He could always kill Inuyasha to compensate.

But then, she surfaces.

Callow and searching ( _in a pink dress with yellow polka-dots_ ) she emerges from the stairs. Once more a child of seven or eight. She has the same sun-wrung, freckled nose. That obstinate jut in her chin when she is upset. Flecks of hazel in her iris. Even an identically chipped front tooth.

Uncanny (mockingly) she is. Every minuscule bit like his—no. He doesn't dare. Not aloud. Not yet.

So close to grasp. And he can, in three strides.

It is her.

It is.

_Rin._

His hand subconsciously twitches for Tenseiga, ready to resurrect her a second (unfeasible) time around.

"Miyo, give me your backpack."

Sesshomaru stills, scarcely allowing himself to breathe.

He must've heard wrong. The woman—

"Mama, look! That's the cake Harada-sensei told us about. Could we get one?  _Please_?"

The woman— _mama_ —grabs Rin-not-Rin's hand. "Maybe after your appointment although you've certainly got enough cavities already. Now, let's go before we're late!"

She pitter-patters after her mother. They meander through the crowded street, vanishing from view as the sea of people swallows them whole.

Sesshomaru pays the check and leaves a princely tip for the boy. He's in a good mood.

He has her scent.

 

**III.**

 

In intermittent intervals that sidle behind and conspire to gut him thorough, doubt penetrates his judgment. Sesshomaru ponders on this potential folly. So readily he believed his brother's wife. But memory is fickle and humans coddle the most faithless ones. Wavering, his tenacity deteriorates further.

Yet, the miko taunts as proof.

_Yet—_

He grits his teeth. Sharp fangs break through flesh. The acrid, ferric piquancy of his own blood slinks down and singes like a poisoned elixir.

Five hundred years is so long a wait (patience has never been his forte).

Tomorrow, he will recommence his search.

For "enlightenment," the priests called it.

\--

Rin dangles a hand into the stream. The unexpected coolness laps her skin with gliding tongues. She wiggles her toes, imagining how delightful they'd feel submerged. The water glimmers like a canvas of gossamer threads creeping to cloak her limbs and coax them to give, take a dip.

Silvery trout stippled with sienna zip beneath the vitreous surface. Plump and juicy, their ripe bellies beg to be consumed. Her stomach grumbles. It has been hours since her breakfast. And  _much_  longer since she's eaten a fish freshly caught. Kaede-sama would enjoy some too…if she could just…

Her prey escapes to seek asylum amongst its friends. Rin sighs. She hasn't fished with her hands since she roamed the wild with Sesshomaru-sama. Disheartened, she worries she may be losing her skills.

In the village, they fish with nets and bamboo rods. Their methods are more efficient, but she misses the primal sensation of a wriggly catch against her palm. The palpable satisfaction of success. Here, she is apart from dirt and clouds and the exhilaration of untamed woods.

She's been living with Kaede for over a year now, learning to exist among humans again. Others like herself. Her guardians are loving and caring, always ensuring she feels welcomed. But these huts and tilled fields are not her home (can never be).

\--

In 1638, Sesshomaru visits a temple in Kawagoe-han. A renowned monk purportedly resides there and has extensively studied the crux of rebirth. And he (loathes to admit) is curious. But the man turns out to be vastly disappointing like all his predecessors.

Terrified, the current abbot s-stutters that Master Tenkai left to establish another shrine fourteen years ago. Which is annoying enough, except he subsequently launches a dreary sermon on acceptance and the present and the presence and capability of The One in the Everyone.

Humans are such uninspired, vexing creatures.

That night, a fire ignites in the north storeroom and by dawn, the entire complex is engulfed.

\--

Tilting back her head, Rin inhales greedily. The sunshine flushes her body and jolts her spirit. She feels ebullient and invincible on this hill. Above, clouds coalesce into a fleecy canopy. Below, grassy blades graze her knees, poking through the gauzy silk.

This kimono is the most splendid one she's received though tiny lacerations already mar sections of the fabric—the regrettable result of an unforeseen skirmish with some branches. She still isn't accustomed to the more restricting fit.

Nearby, Sesshomaru reclines against a plum tree. Lids closed and legs stretched forth, he appears tranquilly asleep. Magnificent with his pearl-glossed hair and the exquisite planes of his pallid profile. Lashes fan into twin dusky shadows, lashes so long they're almost feminine (she'd never dare say).

Intently, Rin observes him, analyzing how someone could be so sublime and simultaneously real. And if he would mind…just this once…

She moves closer—is a breath away.

Trembling, her fingers brush his burnished cuirass.

Raised to strike, poised to collide.

She has to know.

Abruptly, he seizes her wrist, halting her encroachment.

"What are you doing?" he asks, opening an eye.

Immediately, she retracts her telltale hand. "I-I wanted to see what it's like. Why the others do it. Why they kiss."

"But why me?"

"Because your lips looked the softest, Sesshomaru-sama," she answers simply—innocently. Like it's the most obvious thing in the world.

\--

Hanateru slides open the shoji with a forceful shove. She gauges the chaos, estimating how long it would take to tidy up. Spilled sake has saturated the tatami (the mistress will need to replace those). Hanakoto's room is an incessant flurry of rumpled linens, scattered cosmetic jars, and miscellaneous love-wrought letters from her customers.

Unabashed, she giggles over a missive from her sister's latest admirer:

 _In the cloudless mirror,_  
 _The line of her forehead_  
 _Like Fuji,_  
 _Her golden hairpin like the moon,  
_ _Her white-powdered face like snow._

 _I lie awake unable to forget your euphonic weeping and the ardor it stirred in me._ _Though my poor brushwork cannot duplicate your beauty, this enclosed paltry act of dedication is my one solace._ _How many more sleepless nights must I spend apart from you?_

_-Yusuke_

The fool doesn't know of the alum that his beloved oiran uses to induce tears. He cannot fathom that the musical lover whom he immortalizes in bijin-ga secretly ridicules his worthless adulations. He, like the countless, interchanging others before him, comes to Yoshiwara to dream. Eagerly, he imbibes her maudlin lies. He doesn't care for the actual skin behind her death-white mask. He doesn't know that Hanakoto will soon retire from their establishment, for a far wealthier patron than him has agreed to purchase her contract.

Her onee-san is a very lucky woman. As a hanyo, Hanateru knows she won't be as fortunate. Her debt to the teahouse will never be paid. Her visage will never be a vision in print, the muse of poets and painters alike. She takes too much after her human mother. But in any case, she's still a shinzo and has yet to train in many things.

"There you are! I've been looking everywhere for you."

Hanateru bows respectfully to the proprietress. "I'm sorry, ma'am. I was cleaning."

"Let the servants deal with that and come with me. You have to prepare for later. A most illustrious daiyokai has summoned for you."

Hanateru snaps her head up in astonishment. "Are you certain he requested for me?"

"Of course I am, silly girl. Frankly, I'm as amazed as you! But one can't  _really_  infer what these aristocratic types like. Although he was very clear that he wanted you. This is an extraordinary opportunity for one such as yourself. You'd be smart to please him well."

Three hours later, Hanateru nervously nibbles on her tongue as the maid pushes open the screen. Hanakoto has counseled her that this client may be quite "hardy" in his attention.  _The greater the yokai, the greater his appetite!_ Her onee-san's jest stings like a slap.

Suspense constricts in her chest, squeezing her lungs with an unremitting vise. The ornamental pins in her coiffure weigh increasingly heavier as she traverses tatami mats. Heart thumping painfully, she agonizes that her inexperience and blatant human taint will surely offend him (and that will surely be the end of her). She's never serviced anyone more distinguished than the grandson of a petty tanuki chief.

Gracefully, she prostrates to the floor. "This humble one is honored by your patronage, my lord," Hanateru recites the customary line. "Would the esteemed Sesshomaru-sama deign to tell this lowly person his command?"

He allots her a cursory glance. "Take off your clothes and change into this," he orders (almost bored), producing a parcel from underneath the low table.

She peers at the mysterious bundle warily. The rules stipulate that she must not accept gifts without permission. If the mistress finds out, she'll be severely punished.

He sneers at her diffidence. "Open it. I have paid an outlandish amount for this 'privilege.'"

Carefully, Hanateru peels apart the wispy paper wrapping. A wondrous robe in vibrant shades of azure and teal with tawny ocher cormorants tumbles out. She gapes at the furisode's brilliance. Not even Hanakoto has such a lovely garment. Though tragically some frays have disfigured the sleeves and front.

"I'm afraid it's ruined, my lord," she laments.

"It isn't. Put it on."

Hanateru complies, dextrously undoing her complex costume and exchanging it for the single robe. "Does this please you, Sesshomaru-sama?" she chances.

He doesn't respond, and she is sensible enough to refrain from pressing further. Demurely, she anticipates for instructions. But not once does he touch her or utter another word. Merely watches with a voracity and perseverance that drills through the ghostly lead coating her cheeks. Fixed, his golden gaze dances in tune to the lambent lamps. Like pooling resin chilled to amber. And she is the hapless insect ensnared.

Eviscerated.

Dizzy, she strains to keep her expression docile and inwardly entreats for the hour to go faster. Or have him do something—anything—other than stare ravenously, disdainfully. His silent scrutiny somehow makes her feel even dirtier than the notion of performing the most licentious acts.

Hanateru nearly collapses in relief when the incense snuffs out, indicating the fulfillment of their session. Nauseated, she rips off the kimono as soon as the daiyokai disappears from sight.

That night, sequestered back in her chamber, she scrubs her skin raw. A substitute, she bristles. That's what he was using her as.

\--

In her fifteenth year, Rin tells him her decision.

Sesshomaru returns after six seasons of absence with crimson-crusted claws and war on his sword. They meet at the copse south of the village. Stoically he greets her, and serenely he  _almost_  smiles.

She strips him of his armored fetters, is gallant in her votive ministration (her guileless adoration). Memories of miasma and rot flood over as she dusts the wraiths of sand-stricken roads and entrails off his pauldron and mokomoko.

Rin knows of the battles before he even speaks of them. The elegance of a massacre needs no preamble. And cadavers have a nasty penchant for rearing heads long after decapitation. The stains of butchery can never be erased completely. Must be preserved for veneration.

For bloodlust is the foundation of yokai nature.

(Blood on his hands lest in his veins.)

He waits for her to finish her task. Unshirking, undaunted. Only acceptance in her smile and eyes. She will never reject him. He is her salvation (her perdition).

"I've made my choice, Sesshomaru-sama. That is…if you will permit me…I wish to stay with you."

"Is that what you truly want?"

"Yes,"  _please_. "I know I am unworthy. I am weak and human. But I have learned to be stronger. I will be less of a burden."

"You are not a burden, Rin. Do not demean yourself."

"So you will allow it?"

He fondles the nape of her neck and senses the accelerated pulse of her carotid. He could easily slice her throat, sever her life. The meekest scratch of his nail and neatly the toxin drips. Instead, he pets her hair soothingly.

"I will," he replies.

\--

Grim and adamant, he abandons the quest for glory. Yokai denote their development not by years but by conquests. Finally, in the ten thousand and ninety-fifth one after Rin's death, he stands peerless.

There are no more emperors to be deposed or dynasties to be overthrown.

Victorious are those who perdure. And at long, long last, Sesshomaru ceases his restless prowling to welcome quietude. Except, it never comes.

The world is transforming, ever more rapid and foreboding. Moribund, the samurai age draws to a close. And soon, in a burst and a blink, a new epoch will ensue. It is too late to barricade the outsiders; these strange people who land in iron ships spewing smoke and wield deafening weapons. The humans call them white devils from across the sea. But he knows they're not demons. Only humans can be so raucous and gauche.

Even if the foreign invaders had been beaten and their splintered ships cast to drown, the seeds of internal strife have long been sown. The twilight of the shogunate is ineludible. Doomed and deserving are those who cannot glean from mistakes.

Sesshomaru glowers at the pathetic, sniveling waste at his feet. "Stop groveling, Yoshinobu. Your whining only annoys me."

"But my lord! You must help us! Choshu and Satsuma are conspiring together. The British—those pasty bastards—have betrayed us. This will be the destruction of our traditions and society!"

"Our?"

Aghast, Yoshinobu kowtows immediately. "No, my lord. I didn't mean—don't mean  _our_. Mine. I know that one as high and almighty as you would never be embroiled in our squabbles. Forgive me for misspeaking, Sesshomaru-sama! My family has served you faithfully for generations."

"And has your family not enjoyed the benefits of my benefaction since Ieyasu? Are you not the  _shogun_?"

"Yes, of course. But this is unlike before. I would not come to you unless things are dire. If…if I am ousted, then who would pay you the tributes? That craven Toshimichi knows nothing of yokai needs."

Sesshomaru shoots him a scathing glare. "You presume too much of your importance. Human affairs are not my concern. Leave unless you seek death this instant."

Yoshinobu scampers away. And in his panic, he clumsily trips—toppling over a camphor vase. The daiyokai sorely contemplates exterminating this putrid worm right here and now, but that would debase Bakusaiga.

His vassal is damned, and no interference (divine or demonic) can alter that course. The total number of yokai remaining quivers at a scant few hundred. They have always been reluctant to reproduce and zealous to duel. Those who survive now aspire to be gods and go to cultivate that soi-disant virtue (immortality) in the pure lands. Meanwhile this realm with its diminishing landscape grows more and more inhospitable.

_The earth belongs to the humans now, Sesshomaru._

His mother is right (irritating as it is). Heavens and hells are where their race finds refuge. He should heed her advice. She presages that the next century will be brutal (and not of the good kind). And her prophecies have an awful tendency to exert themselves into fruition. Though the prospect of spending a protracted time at her court is more disconcerting.

He could go abroad to the homeland of these "ugly pale heathens" and ascertain just how minacious they are (Yoshinobu's intelligence is dubious). One disguise is the same as another. And anything is better than his mother's mordant teasing.

\--

He is not tender or restrained.

It is not in his temperament to be so.

Ruthless he takes her (all that he knows).

Rin winces as his claws cleave into her thighs. His head dips lower, and hers is spinning. A myriad of sensations, wants, and terrors infiltrate her. Abrasive, his tongue scrapes against her folds. Inflaming her to the core and bruising her heart (already the contusions form). She will be a river of red in the morning, of matted hair and panting.

Pinned, she shivers against the wan moonlight. For a second, reflex surges and she resists. But swift, rough he enters her. And any inkling of defiance evaporates as the heady, salty assault of sex inundates them.

Through strands of silver, she counts the stars as little gasps escape her mouth. The embers from the campsite have wizened to ash. They are isolated in the clearing with only the rustling whistle of budding leaves for company.

Forlorn she feels even with his arms anchoring firm. She yearns despite the pain. Wishes that this moment (this hidden, illicit haven) could last forever.

 _Forever_ , she chants.

\--

In 1962, he begins travelling again. This time, he embarks on a transcontinental expedition and is constrained to titanium contraptions called  _airplanes_. Having rebounded from the devastation of the great wars, the humans are once more intrepid in their pursuits. Ambitious, they itch to plunder the firmament.

On a flight back to Los Angeles, he encounters a woman with platinum-shocked, bouncy curls and a whiny laugh. He spots a tinge of yoki radiating from her; so minute it's negligible. A murúch possibly lurks in her ancestry.

Shameless, she breaches the bar between their seats and intimates that they get to know each other better, what'dya say, hon'? The mole above her mouth flakes as her grin spreads.

Sesshomaru coolly declines.

A month later, on his Brentwood veranda, he reads about her "probable but unconfirmed suicide" in the newspaper. It evidently is causing a tremendous uproar.

These Americans are a very emotional ilk.

\--

Sango adjusts Rin's obi, looping the nephrite pendant around it.

"You look wonderful, Rin-chan."

Although Sango smiles merrily, a grain of sadness filters through her voice. Suzume is a lovely girl, is sweet and clever and pleasing in every way. And most significantly (Miroku underscores) she loves Kohaku.  _Chose_  Kohaku.

"Is this another gift from Sesshomaru?" Sango rubs the smooth jade.

"Yes, and the kimono. But I did the embroidery for the sash. I'd like to make some for Sesshomaru-sama and Jaken-sama before I leave. Last time, Jaken-sama complained that he didn't want useless things when I gave him the handkerchief. But I saw him tuck it into his hakama when he thought no one was looking."

Sango chuckles. "I'm sure he won't object this time. Your needlework has improved remarkably. We better go now or we'll miss the ceremony."

"Do you think the peddler will be there afterwards? I've run out of red threads and need some new needles."

"Definitely. There's lots of money to be made at a wedding celebration."

Rin hums blithely as she tags behind because today is a beautiful day when nothing can go amiss in the grandeur of summer's crowning. The garlands they wove earlier that morning adorn the cherry gates leading to the shrine. Mirthless, the bride arrives with her lips staidly pressed. Yet her eyes furtively dart mischief and love at the groom. In synchrony, they march. With three sake sips, they are tied. Suzume will be the consummate wife.

The peddler is the first to become ill, and then Suzume falls to the sickness. Kohaku cries and implores for her not to die until he too is ravaged. One by one they are snapped like zither strings plucked too hard. Rin is one of the last to succumb.

Febrile, she hallucinates spiraling crescent moons and open meadows where she runs free (never to wake).

\--

Kagome crumples up the study guide in frustration. Calculus has always been her calamity. She'll never memorize the formulas at this rate. And what's the point? She's bound to fail the exams.  _Horrendously_. And then she won't matriculate to university or—

"Quit moping and focus!" she snarls (loud enough to startle a fellow pedestrian). "Sorry! Didn't mean to yell—not at you—just stressed!"

He flees as if she were a lunatic.

Today is the 25th, which means the exam is three days away, which is also mama's birthday and the dinner that evening and she still has to pick up the present that's all the way in Ginza, but maybe she could wait to get it on Monday… _oh,_   _she is so going to flunk!_

Ok (inhale) she's got this.

" _Yosh!_ "

The light flickers before she can cross the street. Kagome morosely smooths out the booklet and invokes the leniency of whatever god can hear. A swanky black Rolls Royce pauses beside her before turning the corner, but she is too absorbed in integrals to notice.

 

**IV.**

 

He traces them to a dental office. Gleaming chrome boasts of Happy Smiles Happy Lives.

She is there behind the frosted windows. And he—

Has waited so long.

And though it is beneath him (uncouth and crude) he detests the alternative of passivity more. So tonight, when soporific bridles muzzle this city, he will return. Like a common cat burglar he'll ingloriously steal past the door. Drudge through manila folders and various files until he stumbles upon her patient page.

He clicks the lock.

\--

Jaken flips through the TV channels mindlessly. Another strike, a pending recession, a mendacious politician, some war somewhere. Humph! Dolts! If only Sesshomaru-sama were prime minster, not that he'd willingly…

"Sesshomaru-sama!" he bellows and leaps up. "I didn't hear you come in! Did you—"

"Jaken."

"Yes, my lord!"

"Find out what you can from this."

He hurries to catch the scrap of paper (a sheet snipped from a doctor's memo pad). Three lines are scrawled across the center: a name, a date, and an address. Three puzzle pieces to be deciphered from an ocean of riddles. And his master's proclivity for taciturn directives doesn't help.

Jaken inspects the name again, stressing each syllable.  _Na-ka-mu-ra, Mi-yo_.

So he's found her at last.

\--

Hungry and cold, a young girl bundles her scarf tighter and burrows her nose into its Tartan cocoon. Her mother is late and it's starting to rain. Without the aegis of her Hello Kitty umbrella (left at home), she glumly settles for the succor of a nearby wisteria. The schoolyard is now vacant except for her (she mournfully waves goodbye to a girl from class). Overhead, the skies are ominously dark as the April storm rampages.

She blinks back tears. Mama has never been this tardy. Fat, prickly droplets leach through the tree's feeble rampart. She huddles by the trunk and ducks down her head, beseeching the gales to suspend and for mama to materialize with hugs and apologies and hot milk. Maybe some biscuits.

The gusts recede, but it's not her mother who towers over, sheltering her. It's a man with long sterling hair sleeked into a low ponytail.

"Who are you?" she says in a mousy squeak.

Impassive, the man bends to wipe the water off her face with a powder-woven tissue. And mystified, she lets him. All her mother's chiding about strangers drain out. Gingerly, he untangles the crooked barrette from her hair and reclips it. His hand lingers for a second above her head before it falls back to his side.

"Take these." He passes her the tissue packet and his own charcoal umbrella before straightening to leave.

"Wait!" she shouts. "Who are you?"

But he continues walking, and she quells the irrational longing to chase after him.

\--

Via Jaken's assiduous research, Sesshomaru learns that her father is a mid-level salaryman in one of his tech firms. Coincidental, miraculous, either way, it works out well. Leisurely, he reads the report.

Nakamura Satoshi (38) with his wife Asami (34) and young daughter Miyo (8). The quintessential modern family headed by an industrious father. Someone ambitious and avid to impress his boss. Climb the corporate ladder as the cliché mandates.

And so Sesshomaru will magnanimously oblige. Fostering employee satisfaction and loyalty is the millennial method (that'll be the new slogan). On cue, a knock at the door.

"Enter."

Nakamura Satoshi grapples with the slippery knob. Briny sweat oozes from his pores though the office is a pleasantly frigid seventeen degrees. He is a fussing pest, effusive and frantic, near fanatical in his endeavor to demonstrate merit. It is almost humorous.

"You wanted to see me, sir?"

"I've been going through yearly performance reviews, Nakamura-san. I'm impressed by your work ethic and productivity and would like to promote you to chief executive analyst."

—Is excruciating for him to say (the title means nothing).

And staggers the human (they idolize bureaucratic jargon)—

Satoshi is flabbergasted at the news. He can't believe this fluke. That morning, apathetically picking out a tie, he couldn't even imagine the president (rumored to be secretive and exacting) knowing his name. Yet, now, well, he's speechless!

"Thank you, sir! I won't let you down, sir!"

"As you know, our company strives to be distinguished in our field by providing what our competitors do not. We encourage our employees to spend sufficient time with family. Are you balancing your professional and private responsibilities?"

"Yes, sir! My family is everything to me, as is this job. Just last Sunday, I took my daughter…"

Excited, the proud papa discloses a litany of quaint anecdotes. Thoughtful, Sesshomaru ingests the details (tempering them into ammunition for future reference).

\--

As Satoshi rises higher in the hierarchy (junior vice-department manager sounds so alluring), he is emboldened to wheedle out a friendship with the boss. How  _fortuitous_  that they share the same hobbies and interests, even alma maters. They must be kindred spirits. In a decade, he could be sitting fat and pretty as  _senior_ vice-department manager.

"Come to my home for dinner, shacho. My wife is an excellent cook."

Sesshomaru slides away the topaz bottle. The imbecile reeks of whiskey and is slurring his words. He abhors these post-work functions. These banalities (indignities) he must countenance for the sake of Rin.

"Miyo is already nine! How time flies! She thanks you for the plush puppy, sir, forgot to mention that. Plays with it every night."

"It's nothing," he says curtly.

But Satoshi has slumped over, the liquor sloshing precariously in his glass.

\--

He is prudent to insinuate himself gradually (insidiously) into her life until he is an inveterate but peripheral fixture that seems to have always been there. Like an antiquated davenport that's too impractical to use but too sentimental to toss. In the attic it sits, unseen and unforgotten.

Almost avuncular, he watches her mature.

It begins innocuously at a company-sponsored, family-oriented picnic. Her father, still giddy from his second promotion, gladly introduces the chief, the head honcho, the top dog, to his family. When polite queries are made, Sesshomaru eloquently invents a story of a deceased wife and little girl lost. At tale's end, Asami-san is on the brink of bawling.

So tragic to have experienced such losses at his age (he doesn't look a day over thirty, must've inherited the business). So romantic of him to institute a scholarship fund in their honor. Of course he serves on the school board. A genuine philanthropist, a pillar of the community.

Cull the fulsome, cumbersome praise.

Humans are easily deceived, and he has been perfecting prevarication for hundreds of years.

Then somewhere down the enchanted line, his role mutates from benevolent employer to quasi-family friend-member. The metamorphosis happens so subtly that Satoshi can't delineate how it transpired. As if by magic (or something more diabolical). He starts wondering if Sesshomaru was first his boss or an old friend from university or a fourth cousin. The particulars smear into a migraine whenever he tries to deliberate more.

Nonetheless, Sesshomaru becomes an intrinsic aspect of their lives. Miyo even cutely refers to him as oji-sama on occasion. And he does spoil her with expensive toys and trinkets.

From her tenth birthday party onward, he is invited to family functions. No one ever questions his presence, simply assuming he's someone's cousin's cousin. And soon, they reminisce over fuzzy but endearing childhood escapades that include him. The prank with grandmother's hairnet? Yes, hysterical!

On her twelfth birthday, he gives her a delicate jade carving of a trotting canine and tells her it belonged to someone special a long time ago. She wears it with a chain around her neck and swears to cherish it with all her heart—will never, ever part.

A naïve pledge from a child.

Just like she promised centuries ago.

\--

From behind a scraggly bush, Miyo combats the field hazards of reconnaissance: a buzzing bee, pollen allergies, and rocks digging into her shins. Insufficiently camouflaged, too tall for full cover (growth spurt, mama had perkily announced).

They're past the torii gates and climbing up, up, up—

The boy turns around as if sensing her there. Mind racing wild, she furiously dives for the ground and skins her knee in the process.  _One, two, three…_ she counts to twenty and braces for a second peep. They're gone. They didn't see her. She is safe.

"What are you doing there?"

Miyo jumps in alarm and turns to the tall figure behind her. "Se-Seshomaru-sama," (-san never sounds right for some reason) "What are you doing at the Higurashi shrine? Shouldn't you be at work?"

"I believe I asked you first."

"I, uh, I was…"

"You were spying."

She blushes but answers truthfully; he can always tell when she lies. "Yes, I was."

"On whom?"

"Two kids from my tennis club. Sota-kun and Ayano-senpai."

"Why?"

Fidgeting, she kicks at the ground, unable to meet his gaze. She must be a blotchy scarlet-steeped canvas. An uncomfortable minute elapses. "I was jealous!" she blurts out finally.

Mortified, her hand flies to her mouth. She wants to expire from humiliation, for undeniably, momentarily, he will laugh in derision at her stupid teenage plight.

"You like this boy," he says blandly instead.

"I do. And he likes Ayano-senpai. You must think I'm being ridiculous. It's just a dumb crush, I know."

"You are only fourteen. It's normal for you to feel a barrage of unruly emotions beyond control. This too will pass. Come, I'll take you home." His tone is surprisingly soft and affirming.

"Sesshomaru-sama? Why were you at the shrine?"

"I come here for personal reasons."

"May I ask you another question?"

"You may."

"What's it like to kiss someone?"

Irrevocable, the words erupt forth like a river demolishing a rickety, mud-spun dam. If only the waves could obliterate her too. Her cheeks burn from the reanimated blush—invigorated with a tenfold vengeance.

 _I wanted to see what it's like_ …

"Can you show me?" she says in the teeniest, most self-effacing whisper.

Frozen, his hand hovers at the car door. He doesn't allow the thought to complete. Can't risk fantasizing, not after so long alone—apart.

_Because your lips looked the softest, Sesshomaru-sama._

"Can you? Please?" she persists.

And mangled, he surrenders.

He plants a chaste kiss on her lips and savors the strawberry sundae she ate earlier. The honey in her hair, the nectar in her blood. She is all that he remembers and more.

\--

She never mentions the kiss. But neither does she talk of the boy again.

For that, he is satisfied.

For now, at least.

\--

Fate is impervious to subjugation is an insurmountable force that harrows and harasses without rue. Likes to play games until muddled the mind becomes with a thousand thoughts toying and warring against each other.

Invidious and malicious, it designs to abduct her again.

But this time, he is prepared.

In the December before her first year of senior high, Satoshi tenders his resignation. He rambles about career objectives, once-in-a-lifetime opportunities, in America, and this prestigious academy where he'll enroll Miyo, in California (a family must stick together). Asami is busy packing, there'll be a farewell gathering, would he be attending?

Sesshomaru stolidly listens to his prattle and gives his best regards.

A week before their scheduled departure, the father is gruesomely slain in a mugging gone awry (the official account). The dealings of yakuza are suggested or a sinister syndicate engaged in organ trafficking. Kidneys and liver salvaged with the rest ignominiously ditched in a dumpster. The corpse is too precisely, cleanly sliced for the culprit to be a layman sans medical training.

"…leaving behind a wife and daughter. No suspects have been named at this time. The investigation is ongoing. Please report all information to the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department."

Sesshomaru turns off the TV and dresses for work. He'll deliver a succinct eulogy at the staff meeting after lunch. And later, as he assured Asami, he'll pick up her daughter directly from school.

\--

Exhausted, Miyo sags into the couch. Her legs tremble in relief against the seat. She never thought to end up here, but there's nowhere for her to go. No one to turn to.

Mad, brash, rabid she must be. This is the zenith of her fortitude (the nadir of despair). She's too tired to care. Can't think logically—not at all. Fuelled with the fundamental drive for survival, she dozes off.

Sesshomaru finds her snoring daintily in his office. And though he is averse to wake her from the curative womb of slumber, there is much to discuss as illustrated by her disheveled state. He slips off his suit coat and lays it over her. She's sensitive to the cold, and it's been a brisk spring. Her forehead has no sign of fever (he is relieved). Though still asleep, she intuitively catches the sleeve of his starched shirt, trying to tug him close as if he could somehow allay her troubles (decimate the nightmares).

"Wake up," he gently commands, patting her arm.

And she does, teary and yawning. "Sesshomaru-sama," she manages between sniffles. "I'm sorry for bothering you. I've been coming here every day for a week. Your secretary just said you were out."

"I have other offices," he explains. "You're safe now. Tell me what has happened."

"Mama's been a wreck since papa died. We had to move since she stopped going to work and can't make the mortgage payments. No one on papa's side is talking to us. They think we've been targeted by the yakuza and don't want to be associated. You know, in case. Can't blame them, not really. Mama wants to go to Sapporo where her parents are, but I don't want to leave. I want to stay in Tokyo despite…I don't—I don't know what to do."

He hands her a bottle of water. She takes a long swig and hiccups violently, the toil of her jumbled speech taking effect. Idly, she plays with the bottle, compressing the flimsy plastic into a crinkly clump. The room is nippy from the AC's robust blast, and she snuggles into his jacket. It smells nice. A hedonistic mixture of luxurious cologne, the leather of a posh, new Porsche, and something else—something ineffable, something familiar and akin to home.

"You may live with me and stay in Tokyo. If that is what you wish," he says with resolve.

"Really?"

"I would not offer unless I meant it."

"Thank you, Sesshomaru-sama!" she exclaims in elation and catches him in an exuberant, rending hug.

She is still a child in this age.

"Let's go get your things. I'll make the arrangements with your mother later."

Assenting, she disengages and waits for him to summon the car. She is mute throughout the ride to the apartment but never once relinquishes her clutch on his jacket.

The odors of oily take-out noodles and overly boiled eggs ambush his nostrils the instant they cross the threshold. A film of old cigarette smoke and fresh grease is glued to the tacky wallpaper. Smog percolating through the sooty window interlaces with vestiges of a feminine shampoo (notes of jasmine and yuzu). Dirty clothing litter a corner, haphazardly discarded and long forgotten. A fly floats in the chipped bowl filled with how-old miso soup.

Sesshomaru scowls in disgust at the dilapidation and piling rubbish. He should have extricated her earlier from such squalor. "Take only what you require. I shall buy you everything else."

Restive, he paces as she collects a change of clothes, schoolbooks, and other necessities. The ceiling plaster sloughs off in yellowed vellum-tendrils, and a leaky faucet drips from the moldy bathroom. An umbra of guilt skulks on the horizon. How absurd. Her inadequate mother is the one who transplanted them here.  _He_  is liberating her.

Together, she wanted.

Forever, he granted.

 

**V.**

 

Inukimi views the painting with a curatorial appraisal before storing it away. The Late Qing work of a dog eating the sun and frolicking in clouds is the most recent addition to her collection. While she adores its folkish appeal, she will be a doting mother and part with it. Her son didn't inherit her artistic panache.

This scroll will be a welcoming contrast to his barren walls. Besides, she has plenty left at her estate in Hong Kong. It won't take long to expedite-ship her favorites. One eighteenth-century piece (she swears) pays a candid homage to herself walking the skies.

She has discovered that in the western lands where her kind originated, inu-yokai are depicted as either the celestial protector of a kingdom who married a princess or unheavenly harbingers of disaster. Mortal imagination is quite amusing. Inugami, tiangou, pan hu, gou shen (gou gui). They're all just words. It matters not how humans stylize them.

Names are changeable. Power is absolute.

She throws back the blinds of her hotel room. "There, that's better. Why haven't you written me in all this time? You know I don't like using those pesky devices, my dear."

Sesshomaru mentally totals the minutes of this visitation. Spontaneous rendezvouses with her are incongruous to his health. "Te-le-phones," he enunciates the word.

His mother dogmatically refuses to use English whenever possible. It's an issue of pride for her.

"Yes, those." She gives a cavalier flourish of her hand. "So obnoxious, ringing all hours of the day! I don't know how you can stand the noise."

"You can unplug them."

"Don't be flippant, Sesshomaru. Not when we so infrequently have reunions."

"Why are you here?"

"I thought it was due for a change of scenery. I'm thinking of staying in Japan for a while. To be with my only son and family." Inukimi pouts melodramatically.

"Is that so?"

She bestows him a scintillating smile, revealing a hint of incisor. " _And_  I heard the most riveting news. It seems that little human girl of yours has resurfaced."

\--

Only three times has Jaken seen his liege's wrath this potent and all three involved Gobodo-sama. And fourth time's noticeably  _not_  the charm. Therefore when confronted with that iconic, laconic frostiness looming perilously nigh, the kappa excuses himself on the pretense of errands. Must not malinger (he is the poster-fine myrmidon).

But that idiot Rin, idiot Miyo,  _idiot girl_! How is he reduced to being her chauffeur in every lifetime? He who has nobly devoted eternity to his sovereign and achieved (after three hundred years of grueling exercises) the lofty height of 149.33 centimeters when in human form is relegated to a nanny. Again! His sallow, bulging eyes squinch in contempt as he scans the rearview mirror.

"Something wrong, Jaken-san?"

His rancor riles. Not even Jaken-sama anymore!

"Oh, nothing!" He chortles awkwardly.  _Lest she tattles his alleged bullying to Sesshomaru-sama_. "Do you have a list of what to get? I can't spend all weekend driving you around store to store. Sesshomaru-sama entrusts me with many critical duties. Indeed, I…"

"Jaken-san?"

"Eh?"

"How old is Sesshomaru-sama?"

"The master's age is no business of yours!"

"It's just, well, his hair is so white. You look  _much_  older but yours is still pitch black."

She did not just—

Apoplectic, he slams the brakes. Seething, tongue sizzling with vitriol, he sputters. "Sesshomaru-sama has a unique genetic condition from birth that causes his hair to be white. You'd be wise not to bring it up with him!"

"What's the condition?"

—Disregards him again.

"Weißundschönen Syndrome."

She stifles a snicker. With academic intrigue appeased, Miyo lounges back like a complacent and overfed Cheshire cat. She shouldn't tease him but (newfound) habits die hard.

\--

They conjure up a system, a semblance of normalcy for their makeshift family. There is sanctuary in monotony, fortified by buttered toasts chewed en route to class, droning cram lectures, and the contretemps of communal laundry.

He recommends his house in Denenchofu with the Venetian shutters and damask drapes and suburban gardens that buffer neighborly nosiness. She predictably opts for his glassy penthouse in Roppongi and lamely proffers a pretext that it's closer to school. He feigns ignorance but installs a curfew. Seedy nightclubs will not be her purlieus.

Initial tantrum aside, she becomes acclimatized to the spacious confines of her new—not home. Residence. She reconciles with that.

At seven they partake their breakfast: her cooing over an epicurean array of morsels, all nutritious and sumptuous, while he leafs through the daily paper with an ascetic, single espresso. Then she rash-dashes off to school with faint dark circles and half-done homework. And he treks to work wherever-whatever that is (she can't deduce an explicit occupation).

After juku, he punctually sends Jaken to shuttle her back. Her favorite is the Bentley (there are notable perks with him as a guardian). At six, she returns to the disinfected domicile (the housekeeper is religiously thorough). Then he joins her for a dinner served at seven. She gobbles down spaghetti and salmon, whatever catches her fancy for the night, and he picks at a steak so blue it moves.

The evening tapers with a postprandial audit on her day and activities. Signing off her report, he withdraws to his study as she goes to her room for a rematch tussle with classical literature.

\--

Debating between watching another episode of anime and actually finishing her English composition, Miyo sees a large, black, and very,  _very_  hairy spider droop down from the ceiling and land jauntily on her notebook. Tenuous, hirsute projections from a corpulent midsection, russet bands on its onyx rump. It spazzes for a second and then freezes.

She stares in horror.

Her adversary stares back.

They wait.

Then they both bolt.

It scurries toward her as she scrambles away, shrieking. Smacking over a penholder and the lavender lamp and whacking her ankle against the box spring. Her foot is barely on the mattress when Sesshomaru is there, so fast as if he teleported.

"What is the commotion about?" he asks.

Sheepish, she replies, "There was a spider. I'm sorry for waking you."

He swoops down to the disarray of papers, pens and pencils, a dented, lopsided lampshade, and the textbook to which the obsidian creature clings. Instantly, he dispatches it between his slender fingers. Crushing the exoskeleton, pinching the goo and gunk and bristly hairs. She marvels at such courage.

"Thank you, Sesshomaru-sama."

He sanitizes his hand with a tissue lifted from the pink bunny box with with a pompom tail. "It's nothing. Now, go to bed."

"Wait, umm, could I come ask you to get rid of them for me in the future?"

"You may," he says before shutting the door.

She uprights the lamp and reorganizes the desk. That was too much adventure for one night. She hates spiders. Outright hates  _all_  arachnida, chilopoda, diplopoda—anything scuttling around on one spiky leg too many. But at least she'll ace the upcoming taxonomy quiz.

\--

Miyo hurls aside her bag with thundering brio and kicks off the patent Oxfords before slouching surlily to her room. She is three-quarters down the hall, on the cusp of privacy and angsty release, when Sesshomaru emerges from his study. Brow raised, he gestures her inside.

"You are troubled."

She snorts. "That's obvious."

Stern, he guides her to the spindly seat opposite his desk while he takes the magisterial throne behind it. Now vis-à-vis, he launches the tête-à-tête. "I do not appreciate churlish outbursts, as you are aware. If you are upset with something, you may tell me. Respectfully."

"I'm sorry," she mumbles contritely. "I didn't mean to be rude. I was thinking of papa's death again because mama called, freaking out, and kept saying how she needs me to live with her. You know, in Sapporo."

"It's natural for a mother to desire to be with her children." (The statement's irony is not lost on him.) "Do you wish to go to her?"

"Yes and no. I don't want to be a bad daughter! But I also don't want want to go—to run away like her. She's not the same anymore. I barely recognize her on the phone. I can't stand how dead she sounds. I miss papa too. So much it hurts. I don't want to lose her as well."

"Grief is a madness that only abates with time. You will come to understand that."

"Have you…lost someone you loved, Seshomaru-sama?"

"Yes, long ago."

"Do you still think of them?"

"Every day."

\--

He teaches her calligraphy as a distraction, a coping mechanism to alleviate the passing of her father. She is a poor and irascible student. Her thoughtless, rudimentary strokes complemented with that contemporary and ubiquitous ineptitude for kanji make her a dismal protégé.

Propelled by exasperation, he captures her ungainly fingers during one afternoon tutorial and deftly births her hackish slashes to beauty. Mesmerized, back squished against his chest, she witnesses an inky marriage of athletic arabesques and swollen ellipses—the soul and métier of bygone literati-monarchs.

His arm curves around her waist as his left hand stabilizes her elbow (steady now). His right massaging hers. She perceives the heat of his body emanating through Armani's meager partition. Ragged, her breath hitches. Suddenly, too short and unsuitable is her dress with the muslin given to hiking up thigh to rear from static clinging. He nonchalantly rectifies the scrunched up hem.

The lesson proceeds.

\--

He is always there when she needs him.

He always listens with rapt, patient attention be it classroom spats, her physical insecurities, the fluctuating moods of mourning or depression at mama's mental decay.

He is always ready to comfort her with wisdom and strength.

He always makes sure the pantry is well-stocked with Pocky and Kit-Kats, texts her little messages not to stay out too late, and cradles her when she sobs inconsolably into his shirt.

He is always her hero.

\--

There are two swords augustly exhibited in his study. Their deadliness sheathed in silken scabbards.

He calls them Tenseiga and Bakusaiga and will divulge no more. He warns her not to touch them, for they are sharp and parlous and barred from prying sixteen-year-olds.

 _Almost seventeen_ , she asserts. He merely bids her goodnight with a reminder not to play the music so loudly.

But (the shoulder-devil goads) he's not here now. On a business trip, won't be back till the weekend. Absent too is Jaken the toady valet and the maids. She (blissfully deserted) has this one, decisive chance to wickedly grope the hilt and awe at that ravishing, argent sheen. Tenseiga, the elder brother, beckons to be nestled.

Hexed, she canters close.

Bewitched, she is snatched.

Clasps the handle, can't resist.

Until traitorous, the blade pierces her palm.

Sucking on the gash, she places the sword back on its altar and vows never to approach it again. Sesshomaru-sama is right. They are dangerous indeed.

\--

He smells the spicy residue of her blood on Tenseiga's edge the second he opens the door. He knows what she did despite no visible evidence. He will have to chastise her for this impudence, and that will incur a squall of pleas unlike any prior.

Her voice resounds that night.

Not Miyo's but Rin's.

_Sesshomaru-sama, please help—help Rin. Naraku…the fog…Rin can't breathe!_

Her strangled mewling that haunts his dreams awakens him.

He sprints to her room, desperate to protect her. Naraku will not, will  _never_  threaten her again. Blood, bile, guts, and anguish. He hasn't experienced this much vigor in generations. The caustic, primordial impetus to disembowel and devour and flick the cords of sinew over his tongue. Naraku, that filth, the enemy—

Is dead.

And the girl thrashing on the bed is unhurt.

"Sesshomaru-sama," she concludes, effete.

He lies down and scoops her against him like he did when she was a child and hypothermic from a blizzard. She almost perished on that ill-fated sojourn in the north.

"Do not cry, Rin," he murmurs against her neck.

 _I am here_.

Achy and raw in the throat, Miyo rouses as the muted mauve of morning distills through mesh curtains. The municipal truck unloads the building's recyclables into its clunky receptacle forty-four floors below. As she disentangles herself from the covers, she vaguely recalls fumes and suffocation then a phantom arm enfolding her.

\--

Every night, the visions come.

Evanescent, chameleonic, they shift and twist like lucent moths through a rainbow crevasse.

Sometimes, she is eight and riding two-headed dragons high above orchards and valleys. Then, she is six and cooking stew with her mother and brother while waiting for father and other brother who are out hunting. Now, she is thirteen and wading in the river with obaa-chan (a different one) to collect fish from the nets. And she reverts to sixteen and in love, is beloved—

She never sees past sixteen.

She is nine and eleven and twelve and fifteen and fifteen again and on and on.

She never sees past sixteen.

Frenzied she grows, needs to know that her life isn't—can't be—over.

And then she remembers it's her seventeenth birthday that day.

These are not her memoirs. Not her life.

She is not—

"Rin."

She exhales the name like a prayer.

\--

Something is wrong with her.

She is plagued by snippets of her previous life (he grimaces at the plangent moans). Bafflement caused by these nocturnal episodes gnaws into her and soon, she begins losing weight from lack of rest and appetite. Her grades while never stellar are slipping further, though that's the least of his concerns.

He routinely checks on her at the fiendish hour of three, and always she is fraught in struggles against an invisible incubus. Dewy perspiration varnishes her limbs, and the sheets are bunched around her ankles. Incoherent mumbling into a pillow. He sits in vigil by her side as she combats unconscious foes. Invariably, she wakes and fastens to him like solitude to a soliloquy.

One night, she (be it from fear or bleary temerity) knocks on his door and bluntly asks if she could sleep there. And inexplicably, he agrees.

Eventually, she is curled up in his bed more often than in her own. Although he proportions her most of the space, she still tosses and turns her way over to him, her girlish, coltish legs and willow-arms seeking his. Mouth puckered, cheek nuzzling chest, a torrid (turgid) tempest exposed to be licked.

And so he will.

And then he hears—

"Rin."

 

**VI.**

 

Inuyasha removes the bike helmet and shakes out his mane. The bandana swaddling his ears itches like a bitch in heat, his chaps are falling, and he direly needs to piss. The leather jacket has seen grander days, but it's his sartorial talisman (saved his ass in seven crashes and adding). And he's definitely gonna need its blessings tonight.

While in line for the shit-stained toilet, a stone cold fox from across the junk-crammed hall blows him a kiss and a purr. He grins at the compliment and replies he's flattered and married. He loves this bar with its shabby idiosyncrasies of mildewed moldings and obscene murals and an eccentric clientele. No hear, no see is the policy. But the cherry-on-top is picturing Sesshomaru on the sleazy, tobacco-bathed streets of Kabukicho, which is why he said to meet here.

Speak of the devil (lo he shall appear): there is the prick in his Tom Fords and Ferragamos. Revulsion and ire written on his face. Inuyasha orders another drink. Hell, make it a double.

"So you found the place," he prefaces.

Sesshomaru dryly retorts, "The sign is hard to miss."

Right, he forgot about the garish board with neon tits. "Now,  _that_  is how you advertise. You should take a page from their book, Mr. Hot-Shot Tycoon."

"I did not come here to be insulted by you, half-breed."

"No, you're here 'cause you need my help." Smug, he downs the bourbon. "You wanna know why the new Rin is dreaming memories of the old Rin. Did you ask your mother yet?"

He must have misheard. "My mother?"

"Yeah, she and I were—"

"How the  _hell_ do you know my mother?"

Inuyasha's jaw unhinges in shock. "You didn't know? Shit, this is hilarious! She and I have been in touch since 1945, just after the bombs. Lighten up, will ya? The world's changed.  _Our_  world is too tiny for old prejudices."

" _You_  are a hanyo. Do not contact her again."

"Quit dwelling on the past. There are less than fifty of us left. We have to stick together or our kind will be gone for good. Plus, c'mon, we're  _family_."

Epiphany dawns on him. Inuyasha is his mother's snitch, the degenerate lackey responsible for her irksome repatriation. The one colluding with her behind his back. As to how it happened, he doesn't care. His sole goal is to expunge this stigma to his pedigree. His oath to the miko ends now. The mongrel dies tonight.

Sensing murderous intent, Inuyasha throws up his hands in defense. "Hey, don't bite my head off. She's just worried. Probably 'cause her only pup has been neglecting her for eons."

Inconceivable. The mutt is sympathizing with his mother. They must desist with this subject before he annihilates the entire district. "Do you or do you not have the information I requested?"

"That? Yeah, Kagome didn't experience anything like that, sorry. She and Kikyo were like ice and fire. Maybe you should talk to your mother after all."

Cackling, Inuyasha heads to the bartender for another shot. Such jubilance only comes once every epoch. He has to celebrate.

\--

He is avoiding her.

Three days ago, he wished her a perfunctory happy birthday and said to buy whatever gifts she wanted and charge it to his account and swiftly left. All executed in the matutinal span of a bite of flaky croissant and still dormant coffee machine. He didn't come home that night or the next, and by civics period today she's envisioning gory car accidents and iridescent IVs.

"Jaken-san, do you know where Sesshomaru-sama is?" she pips from the backseat.

"The master has many responsibilities that demand his prodigious talents. His work ethic is flawless, his manner impeccable. He is admired by all and rightfully so."

She rolls her eyes. He should author a sonnet of his ovations in order for his overtaxed tongue to convalesce. "Does that mean you don't know where he is?"

"Insolent girl! Of course I know where Sesshomaru-sama is. I know every aspect of the master's life. I have memorized every second of his schedule. I simply don't see the point in telling you!"

"Don't lie, Jaken-sama," she declares pointedly and steps onto the sidewalk, slamming the car door.

The imp gulps. "What did you call me?"

But she is already at the revolving portal to the high-rise, leaving him to the menial function of wrestling for a parking spot. Grumpily, as he outmaneuvers the slyly positioned opponent (a taupe Toyota blaring its horn), he reflects on her choice of suffix. Jaken- _sama_  she uttered.

She does not—will not—address him so formally. Such deference is extraneous to the vapid, lurid language of Tokyo youth (of course, one as eminent as Lord Sesshomaru can elicit universal reverence).

Miyo is the typical teenager prone to impertinence and procrastination. She gushes over trashy tabloids, shops in Harajuku, and despises nature in all its incarnations. The sight of a cockroach concusses her comatose. Yet recently, she brings him bouquets of daisies and geraniums pilfered from the school grounds (ants still on their petals) and lugs from the library musty history volumes on the Sengoku Jidai. Then, there are the sporadic, archaic deviations in her syntax and diction.

Miyo is acting like…well, like Rin.

\--

Her son's propensity for an eclectic décor of Scandinavian minimalism and Muromachi Zen is innovative albeit grotesque. And nowhere to behold is her costly gift (stashed in a desolate bureau). Beige and grey and black and marble. Look, the exotic splatter of brown.

Even his bedroom would be boring to rummage through (no padlocked diaries or embarrassing paraphernalia). Not that she would. She's above such vulgarity. Though it's not as if he…

"Have you taken up to snooping as you did with unsavory companions?"

Jocund, she twirls to counter his acrimony. "Sesshomaru, you truly are your father's heir. Her scent is thickly intertwined with yours. Have you  _eaten_  her yet?"

He ignores the ribald allusion, which is markedly the influence of Inuyasha's abominable disposition. "Why did you not tell me you are acquainted with the hanyo?"

She shrugs. "The topic never arose. You and I do so seldom communicate. Why are you this bothered?"

"He is a worthless vermin, the error that lead to father's premature demise."

Inukimi sighs. "You have all your father's bravado and none of his charisma. Your brother apparently inherited all the charms. And you shouldn't resent your father for his paramour. Monogamy is not our tradition."

He flinches in consternation. She couldn't have, surely, absolutely, must not—

"Do not begrudge me an acquaintance," she continues dolefully. "In some ways, he has been more filial than you. He sends me cards every May."

—Slightly mollified from the unthinkable: "Foster whatever pet you like but do not compare me to that hanyo. In any case, we are not here to discuss Inuyasha. You said you might have answers regarding my ward."

"Ah yes, your  _ward_ —how trite, my dear—has been having nightmares and behaving oddly. You wish to know the reason?"

"I suspect it has to do with Tenseiga. I found her blood on its blade."

"Oh? How fascinating. Your father spoke of a theory, but even he did not consider it possible. Who could have guessed it is your human child to attest it. Tenseiga once withheld a part of her soul and now gives it back."

"What do you mean?"

She huffs. Obtuse like his sire. "When the sword revived her, it kept a fragment of her soul—a modicum price for resurrection. Her reincarnation exchanged for that piece by giving Tenseiga her blood. That piece now yearns to be reunified and in doing so forges a link between predecessor and successor. This process imbues the living girl with memories of the dead one. Memories that survived in the soul shard and were safeguarded by Tenseiga."

"Her demeanor has been similar to Rin's."

Inukimi frowns reproachfully. "Memories—even ancient and embedded ones—are not all that constitute a person. They might influence behavior or thought but do not  _define_  who one is. An individual cannot be replicated, for the soul is the  _potentiality_  of a person. And each one is unique. There are no absolutes in rebirth."

"So Rin cannot return."

Now she is incensed. "Have you learned nothing, Sesshomaru? A life is valuable because it's finite. Even the gods cannot amend this cardinal law. You have been chasing after a reverie."

A reverie.

Fleeting. False.

Four hundred and fifty-seven years of wait for naught. The hunger that sears his insides like sulfur upon wound can never be slaked. Wretched is the maddening sliver of hope dissipating. Defeated by fate (that snake) and worse, is crippled by hubris. For he can never attain her again.

A fact.

Implausible. Impossible.

He will make it so.

\--

Sesshomaru is waiting for her when she walks in. Thrilled, she shoots a killer-watt smile. He does not reciprocate, not even a hello, merely orders her to come to his study. At once. Meekly, she obeys and wonders if he's opened the bank statements.

"Sesshomaru-sama, I can explain about the purchases," she says quickly.

"Sit. I do not care about trivialities like shopping sprees. There is an imperative issue we must address."

Smarting from his clipped inflection, she settles into the chair and primly flattens her skirt. He emancipates Tenseiga from its hooked mount and lays it on the mahogany desk. She chokes down a sticky dread. He's discovered her major-minor indiscretion.

"You touched Tenseiga," he announces calmly (too calm for her palpitations). "And you cut yourself on its edge."

"I did. I'm sorry, Sesshomaru-sama. I won't do it again. Ar-are you going to punish me?"

"I shall attend to your disobedience later. There is something more exigent I need to tell you. It has to do with 'Rin.' And who— _what_ —I really am."

Then his visage distorts like an encaustic still blistering and wet and unfleshed. His skin, already pale, blanches to winter-bone as violent violet stripes slither out to take root. The sable irises of his eyes dissolve into murky cataracts, but from the milky chrysalis springs molten gold, nacreous and lethal and ethereal.

She opens her mouth to scream.

\--

He isn't human.

He is a demon, a beast.

Yokai.

The fearsome, awesome supernatural beings from fairytales and manga.  _Fictional_. But he is as real and tangible as the cement and steel of the bridge supporting her.

Miyo rubs her temples and pinches her wrist and nothing. Beyond is the same dull skyline doused with turbid turquoise and pixelated skyscrapers. Only the traffic seems to have escalated; it must be getting late. Her tummy roils from a whiff of distant yakitori grilling over charcoal. She hasn't eaten since noon, and that consisted of a single croquette and tuna onigiri from a sympathetic classmate (she forgot her lunch).

She needs to go home, can't hide forever. But neither can she confront him and Rin— _her_.

He elucidated her on why she was having those hellish, recurring memory-dreams. And her connection to Tenseiga (that idiotic impulse) and with him. He recounted how he reraised and raised an orphan girl and grew to love her and in copious other ways. She taught him compassion and sorrow and joy and meaning. Then she died from an illness, leaving him bereft. For centuries, he wandered alone, biding until she reappears because a priestess from the future saw her here. In this era and space.

Now, he is free from the ennui, the incarceration of grief, because adventitious circumstances brought them together again. This time, he will make it right and protect her so she won't die. She will live a long, happy life until she is old and ready to say goodbye.

They are linked, threaded by red and destiny.

She sinks to the ground and cries. For Sesshomaru and Rin and herself.

Rocking to the heaving of her sobs, she attempts to drown in the screeching of trains and dinging bicycle bells, the din of gaggling babies in parks and supermarkets advertising wares. Lost in the streets, in pity and pain. To waft down and never come up.

She is yanked to the surface, hauled upright.

Sesshomaru inspects her with solicitude furrowed on his brow. He is humanish and plainish again, aside from the lustrous hair. That he won't allow to be modified (one can only suffer so many affronts).

"Are you all right?" he hoarsely inquires.

Nodding, she crashes into his chest and wraps her arms fiercely around his torso. "I don't want you to be lonely," she whispers weakly.

He tilts up her chin. "I won't be."

She tiptoes to kiss him, gripping the lapels of his suit for balance, and takes his lips and scorches him whole.

And it is so different than before.

 

**VII.**

 

She tumbles into his bed with damp hair and a towel cinched around her frame. Nimbly, he jettisons that cargo. She props up on her elbows and swings slender calves, toned from years of swimming and track, off the mattress's end. Starlight and their satellite clones mottle her abdomen and hipbones.

Parched, he approaches. She lies lithe and alert. Eyes wide and incandescent from juvenile hesitation. There is expectation in her repose and tremor in his steps. He kneels before her like a supplicant—starved and purulent from self-flagellation—at the sanctum's nave. She cups his face, tracing along the magenta lines. Claws graze her peaked, little nipples, accidentally nicking the satin flesh of her breast. He licks away the dotting garnet. There will be more before the night is through, a bath of vermillion and alabaster.

Base instincts flare at the taste, need and lust besieging, overwhelming reason. Extinguishing control. She wants this, for him as he is. She knows the gravity and ramifications of their union (he tells himself). His normally glacial countenance contorts into a grisly, impassioned rictus as his demonic energy triumphs.

A daiyokai can only take.

And so he does.

She fights viciously against him, stamina bolstered from the visceral compulsion to flee, to live. Her futile squirming spurs his desire to delirium. The raspy protests are his ecstasy and devastation.  _Don't, please_. Tears and torment, a hiss and a whimper.  _Stop, it hurts so much._ He only does when the blood from her hymen saturates the air, assuaging his yoki.

Bleakness and bewilderment glisten at her canthi and trickle in spheres down downy cheeks. She recoils as he reaches to caress her, to apologize and expiate.

"I should not have done that to you," he says. "I should not have shown you what I am. You have every right to hate me."

She falters. The fact that he has hurt her scuffles with a macabre understanding (an illogical acceptance) that this is who he is. A yokai is not human. And she is fine with that. Because he has been her savior in this life and the last. Rescued her from the bellies of wolves and the cavernous hopelessness following her father's murder. She can never hate him. Cannot help but love him.

Shyly, she rubs where his left shoulder and arm connects, where it still sometimes throbs like the twanging echoes of an alien appendage. The touch enkindles, electrifying, and ushers in a tentative prospect. He is unprepared when she kisses him sweetly and shatters him asunder.  _It's ok_. She expands the kiss. Artless explorations with a pinky tip of tongue.

Languorous and obeisant, he pushes her back onto the bed and trails fluttering pecks and ripples down her sternum and waist. Gently, he parts her thighs (dulcet the sighs) and pursues with an unprecedented discipline. Relishing in her sultry quavers, he plays with the velvet of her sex. He pleasures her with his mouth to repent for his sins and drinks clean the claret-fluids of betrayal. And feasts on this nymphic, mythic delicacy until she is shuddering and moaning and reeling.

With her lax and sate, he positions himself against her entrance. She jerks lewdly at the sensation, hips ceding to his. Supple and wet from the orgasm, her passage envelops his member. He drives deep into her, and lucidity dispels to arresting fervor. Rapacious, he quickens the pace, is dazzled and enthralled. And she is a sinuous mess, begging for more,  _more more more_. Muscles clenching, she rides out her second climax and he joins her there.

The room is rank with cum and carnage. Outside, a sullen rain has fallen. He listens to the melancholic stillicide down opaque windowpanes as they bask in a lilac shroud of fluorescent signs refracting from the drizzle. She is tucked securely under his arm, her breathing constant and mellow.

She is his anathema, his blight, the injurious insomnia to his body (inimical to his sanity). The panacea to his banes.

For the first time beyond enumeration, he feels at ease.

 

**VIII.**

 

By April, she has permanently relocated to his room and clutters up the once pristine drawers and shelves with inane accoutrements. Cheap nickel earrings, amateur dissertations on  _Genji Monogatari_ , popping and rapping CDs, fashion magazines with dog-eared pages. She tosses her chiffon blouses and cashmere sweaters and lacey panties willy-nilly.

He welcomes the invasion. Supplements the gaping holes in her demi-autobiographic retrospections. Expounding the details, the obverses to her being, until the demarcation between Rin and Miyo (Miyo-Rin) is irreversibly muddied.

Like a sagacious tyrant from fabled enlightened despotism, he strictly but fairly coaches her on how to navigate through life, toughen-up and conquer fears, and blossom into majesty. He imparts upon her the history of yokai, of their rise and fall, and why he has not accompanied the extant relics to paradisiacal realms beyond. She has been his purpose (naturally, she had fallen for him). Because this is a love, a bond, that transcends existence.

"Come," he bids, divesting her of vestiary barriers.

Pliant, she yields.

\--

He courts her with a cautious, covetous surveillance (a redoubtable paranoia) as if she will vanish the second he casts down vigilance.

Kimonos and adornments gush from armed vaults. He clads her in priceless antiques, in kosode too immodest for her height and junihitoe too precious to wear. He braids carnelian orchids into ebony tresses and drapes opalescent chokers over collarbones. He buys her Cartier diamonds and mink stoles when she frets over her deplorable grades and next year's entrance exams. His boundless wealth will ensure her future (so long as she remains dutifully by his side).

They visit bookstores and boutiques and frequent movies and plays and whatever random megrim traipses through her mind. She likes to hold his hand as they stroll down boulevards, an ice cream cone in the other. And he indulges her. Sometimes, she squeezes his. Quick— _one, two—_ gone. So rapid and light he barely registers.

As if to confirm, to reassure, she will shield him in this big, bad, treacherous world.

\--

One day, combing through their closet cabinet for pillowcases, Miyo unearths a lacquered box cozily cached between two quilts. Piqued by the oddity, she undoes the latch and deposits the contents. Miscellaneous and sundry identification cards and badges spill out. All different names and faces. No, not quite. She analyzes the tiny laminated plastics—her nose a centimeter away.

It's the same face but subtly adjusted like similar patterns superimposed upon each other and then Xeroxed numerously until every copy is more faded and lackluster than the last. She drops the cards: they're all a caricature of Sesshomaru. These are his human guises.

That evening, ensconced on a living room couch, she doodles in the corner of her math assignment while he peruses an intimidating tome on the the complicated and and interdependent rivalry between  _kokugaku_  and  _rangaku_  and their philosophical impacts on early modern national identity, vol. 1. (Her head aches from just descrying the title.)

"Sesshomaru-sama," she says, plopping down her pencil. "Why do you have a box with a bunch of different ID cards?"

Without peeking up from the page, he replies, "They're aliases I use to avoid provoking suspicion that I am not human."

"But why were they in our closet?"

"I had forgotten I hid them there when you first moved in. It would have been difficult to explain their presence back then."

"It saddens me that yokai have to conceal themselves."

He puts down the book and peers at her curiously. "Why is that?"

"Because you're so beautiful," she chirps mildly before resuming her homework.

\--

Hindsight is twenty-twenty, but not even the most puissant foresight could have predicted this predicament. So now she is lost in the place of her birth, the avenues and alleyways through which she's sauntered since toddlerhood. Hindered from the cherry blossoms she adores. Forbidden from slurping up yakisoba with friends. Just congested roads with unrecognizable names.

She should've waited for Jaken-sama to drive her to the festival instead of taking the train and missing the connection stop then boarding a subway and a bus or two, winding down to somewhere in Adachi. Of course, her phone also ran out of battery because it wouldn't be a challenge otherwise.

She gulps down mounting hysterics. Panic is the nemesis of self-preservation. Be cool, be smart. Survey the surroundings and notate landmarks. There's an art gallery (looks ritzy), a convenience store that might sell maps, some bistros, and lots and lots of people. People who could tell her where a payphone might be. That ojii-san is a good candidate…

"You seem lost."

Miyo whips around and sees a woman speaking to her. The most seraphically (preternaturally) gorgeous woman she has ever seen. Everything about her is perfect from her immaculate periwinkle bombazine dress to the graceful contours of her face—even her snowy hair. Which is weird since she couldn't be older than thirty-something (must be a fashion quirk).

"Yes, I am. Could you tell me where the nearest payphone is, please? My mobile is dead," she says.

"Go down this street for two blocks and then make a left. There's one on the corner."

"Thank you! Thank you so much!"

The woman smiles cryptically. "You should be more careful in a city like this. Lost little girls are hard to be found."

Before Miyo can probe what that comment means, the woman has continued on her way, her slim, tall physique fusing with the anonymous horde of bodies.

She never sees the strange lady again.

\--

On one balmy Saturday in May, Sesshomaru takes her to an acclaimed museum in Aoyama (the namesake of a boy he knew in the 1800s). Closely, she accompanies him through exhibitions of pre-modern art. Miyo muses if he hopes she'll be motivated by Heian and Yuan calligraphy masters to improve her own sub-par command of brush and parchment.

While the lyrical, pithy witticisms of the hermit-laureate Ryokan fail to impress her, she is deeply intrigued by Sesshomaru's trenchant critiques on this motley assemblage of artworks. They wander through wooden flower vases, courtly kimonos, landscapes and seascapes and mountainscapes, and even an iron wakizashi with a dragon-motif openwork. In wonder, she listens as he remarks on a limestone statue of a bodhisattva or an ostensibly dull metal teakettle. He speaks with intimate knowledge of each piece and pertaining time period. With such acuity that it's as if…as if he was there.

 _He was_ , she realizes.

These are objects he once held, used, and owned. His commentaries are not merely impromptu cultural lessons but insights into his history—into him. He is sharing his past (himself) with her. He, who is so guarded and private, is letting her through the garrisoned gates.

They stop before two vertical scrolls displayed in juxtaposition on an austere, white wall. In solemnity, they admire the wistful, painted lines of plum and wisteria sprigs. An inscrutable emotion briefly flickers over him.

"Thank you, Sesshomaru-sama."

"For what?"

"For bringing me here."

_For showing me._

_For finding me._

_For loving me._

She entwines her arm with his and leans her head against his shoulder. He feels warm and sturdy and everything right.

\--

These romantic days, these amorous nights.

Her richest days, her brightest nights.

\--

Late in June, he takes her to dinner one evening, to an opulent restaurant commended with three Michelin stars. Resplendent chandeliers wrought in fantastical shapes dangle from thin, flossy wires. Smoky oak and ivory, virgin-clean tablecloths beckon them. She is dazed, is amazed by the decadent ambience. And feels smothered under the crepe and tulle of her gown. The bodice chafes, and the diamond-ruby atrocity-set of earrings and lariat bobs ponderously as she takes a menu.

Across the table, Sesshomaru is somberly dressed in a grosgrain tuxedo, all crisp lines with a pert, white bow crowing at the shawl collar. He is quiet (even more so than usual) as courses flow from a bountiful fount. She samples scallops basted in ginger and soy and nips at truffles with parsnip and lamb. The wild boar and sage remains untouched on his plate. Two cups of wine and four monosyllabic rejoinders later, she is antsy to stimulate conversation.

"Are we celebrating something?" she ventures.

"No."

"So this is just a prelude to a seduction?" she jokes (tipsy in her third).

"Today is an important day to me. This is a commemoration. That is all you need to know."

"Oh."

The meal terminates in gloomy staleness as he handles the bill (she even demurred to dessert). The drive back is tense, and she twiddles with a stray, flyaway lock that broke from her chignon. His knuckles are taut over the steering wheel. Listless, Miyo presses her head against the window and mechanically scans the mania of carbuncle and citrine beams zigzagging through indigo dew.

Once inside their bedroom, she shimmies out of the snug dress (a no mean feat) and dumps the jewels unceremoniously onto a nightstand. She's too sulky to even care if he'll berate her for petulance. The swelter from gravid clouds is only fomenting her testiness. She needs a shower. Bad.

Sesshomaru unbuttons his shirt and rifles through the wardrobe for a fresh one. The waistcoat is already hanging in its rightful place. From the sound of liquid gutsily jetting out, he takes it that she's determined to deplete the condominium of water in retaliation. He smirks at her childish rebellion. He'll make it up to her later.

Somewhat cheered from the rejuvenating rinse, she climbs into bed with head still addled from the abundant (unplanned) wine she drank earlier. Before she can decide whether to conciliate or brood some more, he lures her in and seizes her mouth. Sensuously, he removes her nightdress. Strong (fatal) hands expertly roam her skin, rendering her breathless. His tongue and claws trespass into every vulnerable crevice of her body until she is pleading.

Slick and rosy, she sheathes him. He entices whimpers and shivers out of her as he impales her again and again. She arches against him, toes contesting for purchase, ruptured by rapture. The sheets, the walls, the very air is caught in a luscious turbulence.

Then, between strokes and kisses, she sights the small date flagrantly emblazoned on the nearby digital clock. June 20th. The summer solstice. The anniversary of Rin's-hers death. She releases an involuntary gasp, so soft and infinitesimal, that it doesn't reach his ears. And her clarity is fugacious as he is pushed over the precipice and drags her too into the abyss.

" _Rin_ ," he growls plaintively into her throat.

When it is over and the disorienting spell of lovemaking has been banished, she puts on a threadbare and treasured T-shirt and retreats to her old room. Pausing for an indecisive second, she glances back at his sleeping silhouette.

Then closes the door quietly behind her.

\--

The café is a clamor of upbeat servers and chatty patrons hankering for one final revel before the workweek tows them back to grubby cubicles. In a remote corner, Miyo pokes at her treacle tart (her favorite confection). The tea has become lukewarm and devoid of redolence. Dispirited, she sets aside the fork.

She's exhausted her list of chores and venues. This locale near Ginza Metro Station is one of their traditional Sunday haunts. He cites sentimental justifications, and she likes the winsome environs. Now, it's her last resort before adjourning home.

Home. Tears well at the word. Where he is waiting. Sesshomaru whom she both loves and resents. The person, the godlike (unholy) being, whom she doesn't really know. The one who loves not truly her.

She supposes she could go live with her mother and grandparents in the north, the cliff of this speck of the universe, the farthest she can abscond. But she knows he will come find her, will never let her go (has not been able to for half a millennium).

Bitterly, she understands why the raiment and gems are so eerily familiar: they were things she owned in another life. As Rin. The name fulminates in revolting peals.  _Rin, Rin, Rin_. The long dead girl whose memory dominates him and beleaguers her.

He will never be free of Rin nor Miyo of him.

A picturesque trio-pair they make in this travesty of a tragedy. This sick, mucked, trussed-up love.

Resigned, she picks up her buzzing phone. "Yes, Sesshomaru-sama."

\--

Shutting the textbook, he gathers her in his arms and carries her to their bed. From the dining room, the tortoiseshell Tompion grande sonnerie tolls two AM. Lately, she's become quite the fastidious, model student, poring over stoichiometry and abstruse equations. Even solicits her teachers for extra homework in order to "catch up."

She's also taken to retiring in her former room with the explanation that her lucubrations will disturb his rest. He doesn't require sleep, he informs her, and neither does it matter if she passes or fails those insipid tests. He can amply provide for her. She just laughs sardonically and resumes highlighting notes.

However, it's not merely her acute, out of the blue studiousness that stews at the back of his mind. Her comportment has changed. There is a lassitude to her gait that's unbecoming to her youth and timidity in her response when he embraces her. Gone are her frivolous babbling about whichever pop idol is trending and ingenuous questions about their past and yokai—gone the rhapsodies to his ears (perforating his ossified heart).

He kisses her forehead as he pulls the comforter to her shoulders. Her eyes blink open, and accusation (marginal yet conspicuous) flashes across bloodshot rims before she rolls over and back to slumber.

\--

He procures for her sold-out concert tickets (the envy of her friends) and rare knickknacks (even a Fabergé egg), all for which she requites with a prosaic "thank you, Sesshomaru-sama" and never looks at again.

She lays out his socks and ties and greets him home like an attentive and biddable wife.

He brings her breakfast in bed and guarantees that her phone is charged before school.

She silently weeps when they make-love (when he fucks her bruised and blazing).

\--

One afternoon in mid-November, they promenade down Meiji Jingu Gaien to see the famous autumn foliage. They and other lovers and families rove through a mosaic of canary and Tuscan and mustard and flaxen. Fallen leaves blanket the pavement while their more dynamic brethren swarm the gnarled boughs. Gingko is the king of trees, the symbol of timelessness and longevity—is the counterpart to sakura.

He sweeps aside a vagrant leaflet adhering to the tweed of her peacoat. But Miyo doesn't notice and shifts her gaze away. He can't seem to captivate her concentration as other thoughts (clandestine and locked) monopolize her mind. And periodically, she trails a stride-length behind, fiddling with her pilled, woolen mittens.

"Sesshomaru-sama…what am I to you?" she voices absentmindedly.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, how do I fit in your life? Why are you here—with me?"

"I have told you why," he punctuates almost venomously.

Perturbed, she attempts a more discreet tactic. "I want to know if you care for me,"  _as me_.

"You know I do. Don't say silly things."

He proceeds with the excursion in reticence and a gyration of yellows and golds and cold. She follows him duteously as she has done before and always (on the back of a dragon and in orange checkered sneakers).

\--

These pensive days, these abhorrent nights.

Her darkest days, her loneliest nights.

\--

In thinly veiled antipathy, Sesshomaru observes as his wastrel-brother brazenly smirks and slumps down onto the armchair, soiling its regal cushions with motorcycle oil and gravel-grit. Begrimed boots still on, steaming with perspiration and other (worse) excretions, and garbed in a drab, tattered biker jacket. Even with seven hundred years behind him, Inuyasha still scorns basic manners.

"Are ya gonna be a good host and offer me some tea or scotch?" The grin broadens in mockery.

"I only permitted you here as a courtesy to my mother—with whom I told you  _not_  to associate."

"Aww, are you jealous,  _o-nii-san_?

It necessitates every smidgen of restraint not to rip the cretin's hide from flesh. "Do not test me, Inuyasha. Speak your purpose or get out."

"Ok, calm down, jeez. Like I said on the phone, I'm here on behalf of your mother since you can't be bothered to see her. She can be pretty wily when she wants something. Anyway, your mom saw Miyo a while back and got curious. She wants to know how your 'grooming' is going."

"My what?" Sesshomaru hisses menacingly.

"You know, your, err, project. Making that girl into Rin the Second. It's kinda obvious you're conflating the two together. I gotta be honest, it's pretty messed up, what you did."

"I have no idea what you're spewing about."

"Stop pretending like you don't understand! I warned Kagome not to tell you that she saw Rin's reincarnation 'cause I know how obsessive and arrogant and a huge  _asshole_  you can be! Hounding me, trying to kill me and anyone around 'cause dad didn't leave you Tessaiga. You couldn't accept that fate took Rin away so you've manipulated everything to get her back in this lifetime."

Sesshomaru exhales slowly—dangerously. Phalanges creaking from the strain, pupils dilating, carmine seeping in. He is so focused on retaining a comical mimicry of control that he doesn't hear a key turning in the front door. "I shall not tolerate any more of these insinuations. Leave. Now."

Pissed, Inuyasha leaps up. Daiyokai or not, family be damned, screw their disparity in might. He's going to pummel some sense into the jerk's skull. "What the hell is wrong with you? How can you do this to someone you love? You're a real bastard, totally fucked in the  _soul_. Conning her and her family like that. Like when you killed her—"

"Be quiet," Sesshomaru snaps, suddenly aware of light footfalls in the hall.

But it's too late. She's heard them.

 

**IX.**

 

This time, there are no suspending bridges or bustling cafes to where she flies for harbor. She simply runs and runs and runs until her lungs are torched to char and stomach in belligerent upheaval as bile and acids and lining churn. But resilient, she weathers through and gains speed and momentum and valor.

It'll be ok. She's on her second wind.

\--

It is well past nightfall when Miyo finally bankrupts her energy stores and shakily hoists herself up onto a bench. She laughs harshly when she squints at the street sign above the intersection; she's been sprinting aimlessly in circles. Not even five kilometers from his high-rise.

Ungraciously, she pukes into the adjacent trashcan, infusing her offal with those of overstressed salarymen and plastered club-goers. With the adrenaline gone, she begins to feel the chills of January through her uniform. Wheezing, she waits for the queasy spasms to slacken, her head still rattling in turmoil. No, don't think about that yet. Just meditate on expanding the thoracic cavity. In for seven and out for ten. In through the nose and out through the mouth.

Her heartbeat steadies. She can think (can plan). Having recuperated from the waves of nausea, Miyo reflects on her eavesdropped revelations. And outlines how everything occurred and culminated here, in this fissure of confusion, of doubt and woe.

How did he first come into her life?

—That strange man under the wisteria tree. (She was eight).

But when did he  _really_  enter the scene?

—That company outing papa took her to. (She was nine).

Who was he then, papa's boss or longtime friend or cousin's brother, brother's cousin?

—Everyone and none, whatever character was most apropos to beguile her family and her into trusting him. A benefactor, a relative, and friend compactly summarized in one. All accomplished via his ungodly abilities bestowed by a yokai heritage. (She was ten, eleven, twelve, and thirteen.)

So when did she walk into his web?

—When she foolish and naïvely asked for that kiss. Thought he was so handsome and nice and honorable. (She was fourteen.)

How did everything fall into place, into the palm of his hand?

—When he killed her father. Because they were moving to the States. Because he can never let go of his prey. (She was fifteen).

Then she stupidly allowed herself to be seduced, to fall in love. At sixteen, he sealed her fate. He was so shrewd and savvy, so conniving and ingenious to contrive this masterpiece. The greatest magnum opus in five hundred years. And condemning her, at seventeen, to dig out of another's grave.

Because reincarnation is a curse.

Rin is dead but not her ghost.

Fatigued and dejected, she lies down on the grimy, slate slab. This hunk of stone in proxy for a bunk on this night and god-him-knows how many more to come. And so she closes her eyes and goes to sleep.

Straggling commuters stomping out from the subway station awaken her. She is hazy for a moment but then, inspired, turns out her pockets to count how much cash she has: four 1,000 yen bills and nine 100 yen coins jingle out. Not even enough fare for Fukushima. Angrily, she wads up the money. She'll have to return to his place or become an indigent teenage runaway, the victim of a police manhunt or thugs. Although he will certainly, incontestably track her down first.

Contemplative, she tallies up the minutes in sighs and the assorted shoes of passersby, trying to ignore leery-concerned miens. Coral ballet flats worn at the toes, a preschooler's cute, pattering moccasins, clicking stiletto heels, and snappy Italian loafers (Sesshomaru's preferred brand).

 _Sesshomaru_.

She lurches up and sees his hideous-beautiful, timeless, and algid features. The merciless perfection of an ageless agelast.

"It's time to go home," he dictates.

Silken his tone and leaden her heart. She is a clipped rose in a crystal vase with the stagnant water only instilling a simulacrum of life. One not even wholly, autonomously hers. She is the dove in a gilded cage. And he is the adder in her bed.

Blank, she follows him to his car and penthouse (her mausoleum).

She can also bide her time (has learned from the best).

\--

Shackled in her room (she refuses to go to his and that much he authorized), Miyo hatches a plot to escape. Calculates how much money it would take, how much she could obtain from pawning the jewelry he gave her. She won't touch the antiques—the execrable heirlooms from Rin. He would be livid if he found out, and she isn't yet reckless (insane) enough to risk that level of fury.

The bigger problem is choosing where to go. She can't go to Hokkaido, won't endanger her family. Her English is proficient. Maybe she could go to Canada or the UK or Australia. Or Antarctica or Mars. Groaning, she jabs the delete bar of her laptop. This can only be a fruitless enterprise. No matter how craftily she schemes, he will always outfox her. Will stalk her to the ends of the earth and poach her from whatever diminutive oasis she can find. And then throttle her barbarically. His earlier admonition disabused her of thinking he would ever forgive her if she ran away again.

Nor was he apologetic (she snorts at the ludicrous concept of him showing remorse). Nor did he offer an exposition on his actions. A daiyokai has no need for vindications. A daiyokai is only governed by bloodlust and selfish, egregious motives that he errs to be love.

And it is her affliction that he love-garrotes her.

So on that spectacular note, she powers down her computer and clambers into bed.

\--

She lets him near only because it would be inadvisably telling if she protested. Plus she can't discern if he privately knows of her seditious intentions. He is enigmatic—esoteric to her lowly, mortal powers of cognizance. But always and forever (she chokes as he strokes her spine) he will be a pernicious snare. Her only chance is to lie low in wait.

What is another rape when she is already defiled beyond recovery? What is another month when she has been robbed of an entire life?

They spar, they dance.

They fumble in the dark.

\--

Toward the end of February, she is almost there. Has accumulated enough capital from purloined goods sold in second-hand, money-laundering dens to live for years if she is frugal. Although there's still no clear destination in sight, she will range the wide, wild world until she finds an abode (or is deranged and dead).

She will succeed.

She must.

The atmosphere is portentously serene when she sneaks in that evening, like the deceptive halcyon days before a monstrous monsoon. Gullibly, she is pacified into assuming Sesshomaru hasn't arrived and is crestfallen when she detects the briefcase flaunting from the dining table. In dismay, she grabs a bottle of decades-aged brandy from the walnut and trompe l'oeil cellarete behind a three-paneled kin-byobu. His palatial home is a veritable paradise for connoisseurs: antiquary-crypts replete with recherché curios and marauded trophies.

Jaded, she takes a hearty swill before decanting a generous measure into a pewter, filigreed quaich (by now, she is well-versed on the profundities of a good life). The alcohol scalds her throat, and she represses the urge to gag. Physical agony she can handle. So she poisons herself and is down to the dregs when he appears.

"There is a voicemail for you." He hands her the cordless phone.

Slightly fuddled, she presses the playback button and pours another serving. Recording goes:

_Miyo-chan, it's mama…I hope you're well…miss you so much! Sessho…came personally and arranged for…exclusive rehabilitation center…well, you know how I feel…those places…but this one…I'm only going because I know you will…safe, good hands…power of attorney…legal guardian until majority…be a good girl for "oji-sama"! Kiss, kiss, click._

Giggling in riotous fits, she flings aside the offending plastic lump. Oh, he is so angelic and cunning in his façade. Duped them all. Out cascades some more liquor. Liquid-courage, pot-valiant. Is giddy, is high (liddy and foggy). What-why? Is th-is in 'toxi-ca-tion?

"How many have you had?" he barks, wrenching away the carafe.

"Not enough,  _Sesshomaru-oji-sama_! So what will you do now that you're my legal guardian?"  _What more could he do._

"You're drunk."

"Yeah, and? I need something to qualm my calms. You murdered my father and now exploited my mother's illness to get reign over me. Has this been your plan all along, Sesshomaru-sama?"

His eyes narrow. Eyes that were once so inviting now sharpen into daggers. "I will not converse with you in this state. We shall discuss matters in the morning."

"No," she says (for the first time to him). "I need to know why you did this to me—to my family—why did you kill my father? You know how messed up my mother got because of his death. You know how it all affected me. Why?"

There is a deafening silence, a pregnant pause. All the platitudes befitting this ugly, farcical denouement. His jaw hardens. "You are more dear to me than anything else. Your father could not be persuaded to rescind his resignation. I did what I must. I could not bear to let you go to the States, away from me." The most loquacious he has ever been.

"This is not how you treat someone you supposedly  _care_  about! How can I believe you feel  _anything_  for me?"

"My feelings, the lo—"

She interrupts, can't even bear for him to say that odious word. "You do not love me,  _Miyo_. You love  _Rin_. I'm just a replacement—a doll you dress up and play with—to ease your bereavement."

"That is ridiculous. You're saying nonsense due to your intoxication."

"I'm the most articulate and clear I've ever been, Sesshomaru-sama. You caused so much misery because of your obsession with Rin.  _Rin who is dead_."

He smiles at her cruelly. "But you are not. Neither is your mother."

Despair and comprehension puncture her. He's crazy, she thinks. No sane person would resort to such despicable, heinous tactics. But he's not a person. He's not human. He's yokai.  _A monster._  "You're going to kill my mother? My grandparents too? All my aunts and uncles and cousins? Why don't you just kill  _me_  and spare yourself the trouble."

"I'll kill the entire world before I let you go. Remember that."

Smite down nations and innocents and miscreants alike because of his possessive obsession, an immortal fixation, this ill-ordained, his ill-pursued desire-need. The only mutilated love he knows and sanctions. And even if she dies, he'll bring her back like before and forevermore.

"May I leave now?" she petitions in abjection.

He scrutinizes her with suspicion.

"Don't worry, Sesshomaru-sama. I just want to breathe some fresh air. Please permit me just this, just fifteen minutes outside the building. I won't run away,"  _I can never run away._

He concedes the barest nod.

Quarter of an hour, fifteen minutes, nine hundred seconds. All she has. All she consented (forced) to utilize before he reels her back to be tightly furled in his grip, now and ever. Letting go of the table edge, she rises stately from the seat and begins to count.

Three drinks she had, three steps she takes. Three deep wells deep and her head is light. The room is tipping and so is she, tipsy-turvy, topsy-turvy. Must walk straight, the straightest line, must not let him see. Past the sideboard boards and chandelier lamps. Twenty seconds and padded falls and in the hall. The door, the front, the elevator door, forty-four floors.

Descends.

Thirty: blurry.

Twenty: clammy.

Ten: gagging.

One: hurling.

Miyo lunges from the vacuum of the elevator cab. The doorman hops aside in alarm as she bursts through the revolving glass.

And sharply gasps.

She is free (momentary). She can breathe (temporary).

Only ten, maybe twelve minutes tops before she must crawl back in, up the elevator, and back to him. She tries to compute but the numbers refuse to cooperate. And she is so thirsty, so withered and dry, and there is a shop conveniently, providentially across the street. Longingly, she extends her hand toward its green and daisy (maybe) awning. It inveigles, and she capitulates. Wobbling, she trips and falls, plummeting. Into the rough pavement, into the careening car, into the darkness of night, and the luminosity of headlights.

 

**X.**

 

Sesshomaru notices the stringy rivulet of vomit by the noble, bronze-glazed doors when he steps out of their private elevator. She imbibed too much earlier, and he was foolish to have accorded the fifteen minutes. He should have more keenly guarded her. Should have extracted the vile liquor himself and strapped her down till the stupor settles. Instead, he arrives to retrieve her at the very strike of the Audemars Piguet's second hand upon the diamond twelve.

"Sir, there's been an accident!" The attendant, a reedy man with flaring nostrils, bounds for him. "Miyo-chan, she—"

He does not hear the rest, or the indignant tuts of bystander-residents as he storms past them, or the distressed stammering of a man reiterating how she came out of nowhere, why didn't she look, why did it have to be him?

He halts.

And hears her shallow breathing, poignant against the howling of an arctic wind, stentorian against the wailing of converging sirens.

\--

"We'll see you in the ICU," the doctor says.

See you in the ICU.  
ICU.  
 _I See You.  
_

He sees her.

Drenched in blood and bruises and abrasions. Broken bones, comatose (the prognosis is bleak). Unlikely to recover, the trauma is severe (dead in a week).

She is intubated and unconscious, unable to sense how stricken he abides, how much he grieves—all the more the second time around.

Such is the irony of fate, the perfidy of destiny.

\--

Between limbo, in precious junctures of conscience and consciousness, she feels him caressing her IV-wreathed hand. His touch is painfully tender and his baritone sweet. In between shrill beeps of the machine, she catches husky rumbles of her name and Rin's.

Despondent, she embraces oblivion. Because he'd rather cuddle a corpse than no one at all.

\--

This sway, this lull (his sway, his pull).

The doctors pace, the doctors mull.

She wakes.

\--

She does not have much time despite what the surgeon optimistically claims. She knows this is merely an ephemeral abeyance in the inexorable aggression of mortality. Swallowing some tepid water, she searches panels of buttercream maple, coffer-tiled ceilings, bay windows with apricot shades half-drawn, an imposing TV bolted to the wall across, a floral loveseat, a rigid armchair, and finally his face.

No nurses or physicians or other patients. They are alone in this sizable room. With the chasmic void of half a meter separating them. He is about to speak when she espies a box on the ground, long and thin and containing something potentially deleterious.

"Please, Sesshomaru-sama," she begs with lamb-like, waning eyes. "Please don't do this. Please don't revive me again."

They are at a stall, a stalemate of wills.

Then he opens the box.

And she sees the sword.

 

* * *

 

Here are explanations of terms and historical allusions/manipulations for those who might be interested.

 

 **Terms**  

 _Agelast_ : From the Greek " _agelastos_ ," a term for someone who never laughs. 

 _Alum_ : An astringent chemical salt.

 _Bijin-ga_ : Literally "beautiful person picture." A genre of art that depicts a beautiful woman, especially in  _ukiyo-e_  prints.  _Ukiyo-e_  means "images of the floating world" and is an art genre that was popular during the Edo Period. Common subject matters include female beauties, kabuki, sumo, scenes from literature and folklore, and even landscapes. A "low-brow" and inexpensive art form that was readily accessible to the masses.

 _Cellarette_ and  _trompe l'oeil_ : A cellarette is a now antiquated type of cabinet that is used to store bottles of alcohol.  _Trompe l'oeil_  is an art technique that aims to "deceive the eye" via visual illusion into perceiving something as 3D when it's not.  _Trompe l'oeil_  cellarettes were popular in the American Prohibition Era.

 _Daija_ : A serpent-dragon  _yokai_  of enormous size who can transform into human shape. Allusion to the Chinese legend of the white snake in which a female snake  _yaoguai_ / _yokai_  falls in love with a mortal man. The original Ming Dynasty tale has evolved over time into various versions. In one, the snake-woman was a pupil of Guanyin/Kannon (the bodhisattva of mercy) because she aspired to be good and accrue merit. There is also a Japanese legend of a male  _daija_  who lived in Onuma Lake and fell in love with a human princess. Although they loved each other, the princess's father would not let his daughter marry a  _yokai_. Long story short, the  _daija_  unleashed hell on the lord's castle. The princess, realizing that only she could stop the devastation, threw herself into the lake to be with the  _daija_  and was never seen again.

 _Davenport_ : An ambiguous furniture term that refers to a type of sofa or a type of small writing desk.

 _Encaustic_ : An art technique/work in which pigments are added to hot wax and this paste is applied to a surface. 

 _Furisode_ : Hard to date the exact origination of this garment, but it did exist in some capacity pre-1600 as a unisex robe for upper-class youth until they became of age or were married. Over time, these robes adopted increasingly longer sleeves and have now become a type of formal wear for young, unmarried women.

 _Grande sonnerie_ [clock] and Tompion:  _Grande sonnerie_ , from the French "grand strike," is a complex mechanical clock that has two different pitches that strike every quarter hour. For instance, at 4.30, there are two high notes followed by four low notes. Thomas Tompion (1639-1713) was a pioneer English clockmaker.

 _Hakama_ : A type of Japanese trouser that was adapted from Sui and Tang Dynasty imperial courts.

 _Inugami_ [1], _tiangou_  [2], _pan hu_  [3], _gou shen (gou gui)_ [4]: [1]  _Inugami_  are supernatural beings in Japanese mythology that are created via the spiritual possession of a dog. Found in West Japan, they can be a sort of household familiar that supposedly brings wealth and prosperity to the person or family they attach themselves to. However, being possessed by an  _inugami_  is physically painful and can drive a person mad.

[2]  _Tiangou_  is a large, legendary canine creature from China who lives in the sky. The word literally means "heavenly dog." Stories say that it will eat the sun/moon, thus causing an eclipse and disaster unless driven away. It is traditionally an enemy of Zhang Xian, a deity who protects children. [Based off visuals, Sesshomaru and his mother were most likely inspired by  _tiangou_.]

[3]  _Pan hu/Panhu_  is a Chinese myth in which a dog deity, Panhu, came to the aid of an emperor, married his daughter, and became the legendary ancestor of several tribes.

[4] The Kanji form of  _inugami_  literally translates to " _gou shen_ " ("dog god") in Chinese.  _Gui_  means ghost or demon.

 _Juku_ : Private schools that primarily offer supplementary academic classes (cram school) but some also offer extracurricular activities like sports and art.

 _Junihitoe_ : Literally "twelve-layer-robe." A complicated set of formal robes that appeared in the 10th century and was worn by court-ladies. Color contrasting and seasonal schemes were essential aspects to how they were worn.

 _Kannon_ : Japanese name for Avalokiteshvara, the bodhisattva of mercy and originally male in form. Kannon is typically female in East Asian depictions.

 _Kappa_ : A small amphibious  _yokai_  that looks like a cross between a turtle and a frog.

 _Kin-byobu_ : Folding screens with gold-leaf foil that became fashionable with the elite in the 16th century.

 _Kokugaku_ : Literally "national study." A school of thought that emerged in the 17th century and emphasized a return to classical Japanese culture and history.

 _Kosode_ : Literally "small sleeves." A type of robe that has changed in meaning and form throughout the ages and eventually gave rise to the modern kimono. Originally an under-robe, by the Sengoku Jidai, it was accepted as outerwear.

 _Murúch_ : A mermaid from Irish mythology.

 _Oiran_ : A high-class courtesan in the Edo Period who was highly trained in culture, the traditional arts, and clever conversation. They painted their faces white with a lead-based makeup, wore elaborate ornamental pins in their hair along with complicated layers of robes, and were usually sold to brothel-teahouses at young ages by impoverished families. The celebrated, elite ones were able to buy out their contracts, predominantly with the help of a wealthy patron.

 _Quaich_ : A traditional Scottish drinking vessel mostly used for whiskey and brandy.

 _Rangaku_ : Literally "Dutch learning." Began in the late 18th century as an academic movement to learn the Dutch language in order to study Western scientific knowledge.

 _Shacho_ : A company president; can be used to address one's boss who holds that position.

 _Shinzo_ : A teenage apprentice courtesan who serves and trains under her " _onee-san_ " (older sister).

 _Tanuki_ : Japanese raccoon dog.

 _Wakizashi_ : A short sword traditionally worn by samurai.

 _Weißundschönen Syndrome_ : A little joke of mine. Weißundschönen breaks down to weiß und schönen (white and nice/pretty). 

 _*_ A note on  _Yokai_ :  _Yokai_ are strange, supernatural beings. They can be a demon, a ghost, a goblin, a beast, a phenomenal being, etc. The term is too broad and vague to denote one particular kind of entity. Some are depicted as merely mischievous while others are malevolent or even benevolent. Japanese folklore is an amalgamation of different traditions and sources; original, native Shinto and later Buddhism transmitted from China are significant influences.

**Figures**

Ryokan (1758-1831): An unconventional Zen Buddhist monk who lived most of his life as a hermit and became renowned for his poetry and calligraphy. [I highly recommend checking out some of his poems and life anecdotes; a very witty and humorous character.]

Tenkai (1536-1643): A Tendai Buddhist monk who was the abbot of Kita-in in Kawagoe-han. He served closely under Shoguns Ieyasu, Hidetada, and Iemitsu.

Toshimichi (1830-1878): Okubo Toshimichi was a samurai of Satsuma who was involved in the Satsuma-Choshu Alliance in 1866.

Yoshinobu (1837-1913): The 15th and last Tokugawa shogun.

Yusuke, personal name of Kitagawa Utamaro (c.1753-1806): An  _ukiyo-e_  artist who was most famous for the  _bijin-ga_  he created in the 1790s. The "Like Fuji" poem appears as an inscription on Utamaro's  _Powdering the Neck_ , c.1790.

**Dates and Events**

1638: A fire burned down Kita-in, a major temple of the Tendai Buddhist sect in Kawagoe-han (a feudal domain under the Tokugawa Shogunate). The third shogun, Iemitsu, transferred a portion of Edo Castle to Kawagoe as part of the rebuilding process. Original parts of the castle can still be seen at Kita-in today.

1962: Marilyn Monroe who had Irish ancestry from her mother's side died in Brentwood, Los Angeles. [Yeah, I'm just going leave it at that…]

**Locations**

Adachi, Aoyama, Denenchofu, Ginza, Harajuku, Kabukicho, Roppongi, and Shibuya are all areas within the Tokyo Metropolis. Kabukicho is an entertainment/red-light district.

Choshu and Satsuma: Two feudal domains that formed a secret alliance in 1866 to overthrow the Tokugawa Shogunate as part of the Boshin War (Japanese Revolution that ended the Tokugawa Shogunate and led to the Meiji Restoration).

The Meiji Jingu Gaien: Built in 1926, this cultural center in Aoyama offers various sporting facilities, galleries, and a long street lined with gingko trees. A gingko-viewing festival is held there for about two weeks every year in November.

The Nezu Museum: The Nezu Museum in Aoyama opened in 1941. The site is the former residence of Nezu Kaichiro (1860-1940), the railway industrialist after whom the museum was named, and displays art objects that were part of his personal collection. [I took inspiration from actual works that can be viewed here and a LOT of artistic liberty on their history in relation to this fic.]

Yoshiwara: Edo's government-sanctioned red-light district.


End file.
